Error opening 'Auth' auth file: /config/openvpn-credentials.txt: Permission denied (errno=13)

[steelcowboy]

Is there a pinned issue for this?

• I have read the pinned issues and could not find my issue

Is there an existing or similar issue/discussion for this?

• I have searched the existing issues
• I have searched the existing discussions

Is there any comment in the documentation for this?

• I have read the documentation, especially the FAQ and Troubleshooting parts

Is this related to a provider?

• I have checked the provider repo for issues
• My issue is NOT related to a provider

Are you using the latest release?

• I am using the latest release

Have you tried using the dev branch latest?

• I have tried using dev branch

Docker run config used

podman run --privileged -d \
              -v transmission-data:/data \
              -v transmission-config:/config \
              -e OPENVPN_PROVIDER=PROTONVPN \
              -e OPENVPN_CONFIG=uk.protonvpn.udp \
              -e DISABLE_PORT_FORWARDER=false \
              -e LOCAL_NETWORK=192.168.0.0/16 \
              -p 9091:9091 \
              --secret openvpn_creds \    
              haugene/transmission-openvpn:dev

Current Behavior

When starting container, regardless of how secrets are passed (environment variable, podman secrets):

Error opening 'Auth' auth file: /config/openvpn-credentials.txt: Permission denied (errno=13)

/var/lib/containers/storage/volumes# ls -l transmission-config/_data/
total 8
-r--r--r-- 1 root root  54 Jan 25 12:21 openvpn-credentials.txt
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root   2 Jan 25 12:37 transmission-credentials.txt
drwxr-xr-x 1 root root 258 Jan 25 12:21 vpn-configs-contrib

Expected Behavior

openvpn should be running as root so should have no problem reading the credentials file

How have you tried to solve the problem?

Tried passing in the secret as an environment variable and using podman secrets, same result. Also deleted and re-created the config volume, also tried not passing in a volume entirely. Always fails to read openvpn-credentials.txt

Tried both stable and dev branch

Log output

[dumb-init] Detached from controlling tty, ignoring the first SIGHUP and SIGCONT we receive.
[dumb-init] Child spawned with PID 2.
[dumb-init] setsid complete.
[dumb-init] Received signal 1.
[dumb-init] Ignoring tty hand-off signal 1.
[dumb-init] Received signal 18.
[dumb-init] Ignoring tty hand-off signal 18.
Starting container with revision: 07edc50256d2805e977a80e87c3369413f10b626
TRANSMISSION_HOME is currently set to: /config/transmission-home
Creating TUN device /dev/net/tun
Using OpenVPN provider: PROTONVPN
Running with VPN_CONFIG_SOURCE auto
No bundled config script found for PROTONVPN. Defaulting to external config
Will get configs from https://github.com/haugene/vpn-configs-contrib.git
Repository is already cloned, updating
HEAD is now at 12f160c6a Update config files
Found configs for PROTONVPN in /config/vpn-configs-contrib/openvpn/protonvpn, will replace current content in /etc/openvpn/protonvpn
Starting OpenVPN using config uk.protonvpn.udp.ovpn
Modifying /etc/openvpn/protonvpn/uk.protonvpn.udp.ovpn for best behaviour in this container
Modification: Point auth-user-pass option to the username/password file
Modification: Change ca certificate path
Modification: Change ping options
Modification: Update/set resolv-retry to 15 seconds
Modification: Change tls-crypt keyfile path
Modification: Set output verbosity to 3
Modification: Remap SIGUSR1 signal to SIGTERM, avoid OpenVPN restart loop
Modification: Updating status for config failure detection
adding route to local network 192.168.0.0/16 via 10.88.0.1 dev eth0
2026-01-25 19:37:47 Note: Kernel support for ovpn-dco missing, disabling data channel offload.
2026-01-25 19:37:47 WARNING: file '/config/openvpn-credentials.txt' is group or others accessible
2026-01-25 19:37:47 OpenVPN 2.6.14 aarch64-unknown-linux-gnu [SSL (OpenSSL)] [LZO] [LZ4] [EPOLL] [PKCS11] [MH/PKTINFO] [AEAD] [DCO]
2026-01-25 19:37:47 library versions: OpenSSL 3.0.13 30 Jan 2024, LZO 2.10
2026-01-25 19:37:47 DCO version: N/A
2026-01-25 19:37:47 Error opening 'Auth' auth file: /config/openvpn-credentials.txt: Permission denied (errno=13)
2026-01-25 19:37:47 Exiting due to fatal error
[dumb-init] Received signal 17.
[dumb-init] A child with PID 2 exited with exit status 1.
[dumb-init] Forwarded signal 15 to children.
[dumb-init] Child exited with status 1. Goodbye.

HW/SW Environment

- OS: Ubuntu 25.10 aarch64
- Podman: 5.4.2

Anything else?

No response