Natively can dress up as Terminal, but its screen-share hiding is best effort
Zoom has a setting that can expose the overlay, and macOS has its own caveat. The practical test happens at the receiving end of the call.
An AI meeting assistant that appears as Terminal is an unusually literal way to hide work behind more work. Natively can put on a system utility’s name while keeping its floating notes out of supported screen shares. Terminal illness, apparently, now includes pretending to be Terminal.
Natively’s repository describes several separate layers of camouflage. Its process disguise can present the app as Terminal, System Settings or Activity Monitor on macOS and Windows. Another setting removes the Dock, taskbar and tray icons. Those changes affect what someone browsing the desktop might notice, rather than deciding which pixels a recorder receives.
Capture protection works by marking windows private. That extends past the main overlay to tooltips, dropdowns, dialogs, file pickers and notifications, according to the developer. A private note with a very public popup would be a remarkably thorough way to defeat the purpose, so those supporting windows matter as much as the floating panel.
The Zoom instructions name the switch that changes the outcome: Settings, Share Screen, Advanced, then Screen capture mode. The mode with window filtering respects the private-window request. The mode without window filtering captures the raw screen and can expose Natively. One missing phrase in a settings menu can open the curtains on the whole meeting.
The developer calls stealth “best-effort,” with an explicit limitation for macOS 15.4 and later: modern capture tools can still see the app. Dedicated proctoring software is outside its guarantee, too. This account follows the project’s documentation; it does not establish which capture methods currently conceal every window on a particular machine.
The meeting tools themselves go beyond a hidden answer box. Natively documents a notepad beside a live transcript, meeting-aware questions, and buttons for recaps or follow-up questions. Its automatic-answer mode is a beta feature and starts switched off. That matters when an assistant could otherwise start volunteering an answer while somebody is still trying to explain the problem (helpful, until it isn’t).
Local model support and cloud-provider support also describe different routes for the conversation. The repository documents an Ollama option, while a configured remote provider sends requests elsewhere. A desktop window can stay on your computer while the question behind it travels. The same inspection that checks what the audience sees needs to check where the meeting information goes.
The license section is another place where the headline’s free needs its footnote. Source access permits inspection and modification under its stated terms; profit-oriented uses require written permission. A visible repository doesn’t automatically make a company deployment free.
Future OS and conferencing changes can alter the capture path without changing the disguise. That leaves an oddly specific maintenance chore for anyone relying on it: after an update, the supposedly invisible assistant needs another screen test.
Terminal still needs an audition.