Guide: How to Copy Your Mac Data When USB Write Access Is Restricted

This is human typing: I manually tested the process, and prompt AI to generate the post.

If your Mac does not allow direct USB write access in normal mode, you can copy your data through macOS Recovery Mode by using Terminal.

Steps

1. Enter Recovery Mode
   Press and hold the power button while starting the Mac until the startup options screen appears.
   Select Options, then click Continue to enter Recovery Mode.
2. Mount and Unlock the Data Disk
   Open Disk Utility from the recovery menu.
   Locate the Data volume, then click Mount.
   Enter your user account password when prompted to decrypt and unlock the disk.
3. Open Terminal
   From the top menu bar, select Utilities > Terminal.
4. Locate Your USB Drive
   In Terminal, navigate to the /Volumes directory to find your USB drive name:ls /VolumesThis will show all mounted disks, including your USB drive.
5. Locate Your Personal Data
   Your personal files are typically stored under:/Volumes/Data/Users/<username>/Replace <username> with your actual Mac username.
6. Copy the Data
   Use the cp -r command to copy files or folders to the USB drive:cp -r /Volumes/Data/Users/<username>/Documents /Volumes/<USB_NAME>/Replace <USB_NAME> with the name of your USB drive.

Notes

• Make sure the USB drive is properly mounted before copying.
• Depending on the amount of data, the copy process may take some time.
• You can use ls to verify that the files have been copied successfully.