# 1.1.11: /etc/dovecot/dovecot.conf # OS: Linux 2.6.28-14-server x86_64 Ubuntu 9.04
Here's the situation: I have several local clients (Thunderbird) which do not use TLS at all. It's plaintext completely, on port 143, because the connection is local and there are no unauthorized users on this network (it's a home network). I want to keep it that way to keep things simple.
Tools / Account Settings / Server Settings: Use Secure Connection: Never Use Secure Authentication: unchecked
Until now, this has worked very well. No problems so far.
But now I am also setting up IMAPS for remote iPhone clients, with client/server certificates. This is how I generated the certs:
http://impetus.us/~rjmooney/projects/misc/clientcertauth.html
On the iPhone I uploaded the client.crt file (couldn't import client.p12 for some reason). For Dovecot I am using ca.crt, server.crt and server.key.
ssl_listen: *:993 ssl_disable: no ssl_ca_file: /blah/ca.crt ssl_cert_file: /blah/server.crt ssl_key_file: /blah/server.key ssl_key_password: ssl_parameters_regenerate: 168 ssl_cipher_list: ALL:!LOW:!SSLv2 ssl_cert_username_field: commonName ssl_verify_client_cert: yes disable_plaintext_auth: no auth default: mechanisms: plain login ssl_require_client_cert: no ssl_username_from_cert: no
I analyzed the connection on 993 with Wireshark and apparently all is good: it's encrypted, I see the certificate exchanges taking place.
But I am worried about authenticating the connections from the iPhone and I would like to configure "ssl_require_client_cert: yes" so that a valid certificate is always required. But if I do that then Thunderbird fails to login because it's required a certificate.
This is puzzling. I thought that setting would only influence SSL connections. But apparently it also affects plaintext logins from Thunderbird.
Is there a way to require a cert from the iPhone TLS connections on port 993, but do not require it from clients connecting to port 143?
-- Florin Andrei