...which is pointless, because in the last two major MacOS releases (well, now three) an Apple Silicon system will not only remain connected to any bluetooth audio devices and wifi (even if "wake for network access" is set to "never"), it will actively seek connections with bluetooth audio devices that are turned on or come into range.
Not only is this a huge potential privacy issue, it's extremely annoying, because on many bluetooth headphones, it makes it impossible to, say, connect your phone to the headphones.
The issue with remaining on wifi is also extremely annoying if you're connected to a hotspot device. I discovered well into a vacation that my macbook was remaining connected to a hotspot and using up data - despite both "low data mode" (which has a penchant for magically turning itself off) and "wake for network access" set to never.
There was an option to disable allowing a bluetooth device to "wake" the system, which stops the mac from keeping bluetooth connections active during sleep, but that was removed in Catalina.
There's no excuse for removal of such an option, nor is there any excuse for not setting some logic such that only keyboards and mice retain active bluetooth connections.
The dumbification of MacOS marches on, as some anonymous mid-tier executive at Apple continues his or her mission to turn MacOS into iOS. We also lost wifi network priority a couple releases ago as well - a move that is so unfathomably stupid it defies belief. You used to be able to set a hotspot as high priority and then, say, a cafe's free (and far less secure) wifi network as a lower priority, and when you wanted to do something on the hotspot, you could just turn it on, and your mac would prefer that network. Now it's a roll of the dice at best.
Not only is this a huge potential privacy issue, it's extremely annoying, because on many bluetooth headphones, it makes it impossible to, say, connect your phone to the headphones.
The issue with remaining on wifi is also extremely annoying if you're connected to a hotspot device. I discovered well into a vacation that my macbook was remaining connected to a hotspot and using up data - despite both "low data mode" (which has a penchant for magically turning itself off) and "wake for network access" set to never.
There was an option to disable allowing a bluetooth device to "wake" the system, which stops the mac from keeping bluetooth connections active during sleep, but that was removed in Catalina.
There's no excuse for removal of such an option, nor is there any excuse for not setting some logic such that only keyboards and mice retain active bluetooth connections.
The dumbification of MacOS marches on, as some anonymous mid-tier executive at Apple continues his or her mission to turn MacOS into iOS. We also lost wifi network priority a couple releases ago as well - a move that is so unfathomably stupid it defies belief. You used to be able to set a hotspot as high priority and then, say, a cafe's free (and far less secure) wifi network as a lower priority, and when you wanted to do something on the hotspot, you could just turn it on, and your mac would prefer that network. Now it's a roll of the dice at best.