Brother accused of locking down third-party printer ink cartridges via forced firmware updates, removing older firmware versions from support portals [see comments]
I've never had issues with networking or drivers with my Brother printer. I don't have any Apple devices, but on Windows and Linux I just use the drivers that come with the OS.
I've not had a Brother printer so, can't say from experience. My Epson Ecotank needed a driver to work. Setting it up on an RPi 3B with a CUPS server took care of it.
I could see the argument that it's more air gapped this way. Without having physical access to the Pi (or at least SSH access), it'd be hard to get any network connection through USB.
But personally, I just blocked outgoing traffic from the printer.