AI Overlay for Pearson OnVUE Live Proctor on Mac
Pearson VUE's OnVUE platform delivers the high-stakes IT and professional certifications most working engineers eventually sit for: AWS, Microsoft, Cisco, CompTIA, ITIL, PMP, and dozens more. On Mac it ships as a notarized native app with a live human proctor watching through a WebRTC stream.
OnVUE is a thick Mac client signed and notarized by Pearson. After the room scan, biometric photo, and ID upload, the app pins itself to the foreground, captures the screen at the OS level via ScreenCaptureKit (the same API screen-recording apps use), and pushes a live WebRTC stream to a Pearson proctor pool. The proctor watches the stream, talks to you over the webcam, and can pause the exam if they see something suspicious. The capture path is the part LDBypass intersects: ScreenCaptureKit honors per-window exclusion at the compositor level, so a window flagged private is composited to the display but skipped when frames are handed back to OnVUE. The webcam, microphone, identity, and room scan are unrelated to the overlay and operate normally. Pearson's most recent OnVUE candidate tech requirements (v.26.4) still list macOS 12+ as supported, and the secure-browser process check on Sonoma is well documented as catching legitimate Apple features like Stage Manager and Universal Control rather than user-mode overlays.
Key points
- OnVUE is used for AWS, Microsoft, Cisco, CompTIA, ITIL, PMP, ISACA, GIAC, and EC-Council exam delivery.
- On Mac, the secure browser is a notarized native app, not a kernel extension; it captures via ScreenCaptureKit on macOS 12.3+.
- The live proctor sees the same buffer OnVUE captures; a window the OS hides from that buffer is invisible to the human too.
- OnVUE pre-exam process check enumerates running apps; LDBypass ships with a per-build randomized bundle ID and display name so it does not list as "LDBypass".
- Close the overlay during the room scan because the phone camera is a separate device and the overlay only hides from software screen capture.
How it works
┌── macOS host ─────────────────────────────────┐ │ ┌── browser tab + WebRTC ──────┐ │ │ │ Live screen share to │ ← stream │ │ │ remote human proctor │ follows │ │ └──────────────────────────────┘ capture │ │ APIs │ │ ┌── LDBypass overlay ──────────┐ │ │ │ Excluded from getDisplayMedia│ ← hidden │ │ └──────────────────────────────┘ from share│ └───────────────────────────────────────────────┘
Compatibility on Mac
| macOS 14 Sonoma+ | Yes (required for window-privacy API) | ✓ |
| Apple Silicon (M1/M2/M3/M4) | Native arm64 build | ✓ |
| Intel Macs (2019+) | Universal binary supported | ✓ |
| OnVUE Mac client (v.26.4+) | ScreenCaptureKit on macOS 12.3+ | ✓ |
| Live human proctor stream | WebRTC pulls from filtered capture buffer | ✓ |
| External monitors | OnVUE blocks; use built-in display | ~ |
Common questions
Does OnVUE detect overlays through its process check?
OnVUE check looks for known bad processes by name (other proctor-blocking tools, virtualization, remote desktop). LDBypass uses a randomized innocuous bundle ID per build, so it does not match any of OnVUE named blocklists.
Will the live proctor notice I am looking at content they cannot see?
Eye-tracking only knows where your gaze lands on the physical monitor. The proctor sees a video stream of your face plus a video stream of your screen; both show you reading what looks like the exam window.
Which OnVUE-delivered exams does this guide apply to?
All of them. The OnVUE capture pipeline is shared across AWS, Microsoft, Cisco, CompTIA, ITIL, PMP and the rest of the catalog.
What if Pearson asks me to share my entire screen during a tech check?
macOS "share entire screen" path still goes through the same compositor, so flagged windows remain absent from the share.
Do I need to disable Stage Manager or Handoff like Pearson support says?
Yes, follow Pearson standard Sonoma advice (disable Stage Manager, Handoff, Universal Control). Those are unrelated to the overlay and are required for OnVUE secure-browser check to pass at all.