dovecot - Aug 2020 - Doveadm error since 2.3.11.3 when run as unprivileged user

I allow users to run 'doveadm' for mailbox maintenance (to expunge  
mail for instance). Since the upgrade to 2.3.11.3, this no longer  
works and results in the following error message:

doveconf: Fatal: Error in configuration file  
/etc/dovecot/conf.d/10-ssl.conf line 13: ssl_key: Can't open file  
/etc/ssl/private/de-korte.org.key: Permission denied

This is no surprise, as non-privileged users are not allowed to read  
the private keys of the server. Question is, why is doveadm trying to  
read this key in the first place (it is not needed for mailbox  
maintenance) and why is it failing now?

Regards, Arjen

On 13. Aug 2020, at 11.00, Arjen de Korte <build+dovecot at de-korte.org>
wrote:
> 
> I allow users to run 'doveadm' for mailbox maintenance (to expunge
mail for instance). Since the upgrade to 2.3.11.3, this no longer works and
results in the following error message:
> 
> doveconf: Fatal: Error in configuration file
/etc/dovecot/conf.d/10-ssl.conf line 13: ssl_key: Can't open file
/etc/ssl/private/de-korte.org.key: Permission denied
> 
> This is no surprise, as non-privileged users are not allowed to read the
private keys of the server. Question is, why is doveadm trying to read this key
in the first place (it is not needed for mailbox maintenance) and why is it
failing now?
There were some ssl setting handling cleanups in v2.3.11, which caused this. I
guess the proper fix for this would be to split SSL client settings and SSL
server settings. So doveadm would still read the SSL client settings without
trying to read the SSL server settings and failing there.

On 13. Aug 2020, at 11.29, Timo Sirainen <timo at sirainen.com>
wrote:
> 
> On 13. Aug 2020, at 11.00, Arjen de Korte <build+dovecot at
de-korte.org> wrote:
>> 
>> I allow users to run 'doveadm' for mailbox maintenance (to
expunge mail for instance). Since the upgrade to 2.3.11.3, this no longer works
and results in the following error message:
>> 
>> doveconf: Fatal: Error in configuration file
/etc/dovecot/conf.d/10-ssl.conf line 13: ssl_key: Can't open file
/etc/ssl/private/de-korte.org.key: Permission denied
>> 
>> This is no surprise, as non-privileged users are not allowed to read
the private keys of the server. Question is, why is doveadm trying to read this
key in the first place (it is not needed for mailbox maintenance) and why is it
failing now?
> 
> There were some ssl setting handling cleanups in v2.3.11, which caused
this. I guess the proper fix for this would be to split SSL client settings and
SSL server settings. So doveadm would still read the SSL client settings without
trying to read the SSL server settings and failing there.
As a workaround, it should be possible to put the ssl_key into a separate config
file and use !Include_try for it. For example in dovecot.conf:

!include_try ssl-keys.conf