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keychain not working after El Capitan

Suddenly, my keychain (local) access is not work - it won't accept my keychain password to show other passwords. Fix? All in all El Capitan hasn't been very good. My other MacBook Pro's keyboard sound buttons don't function at all.

MacBook (13-inch Aluminum Late 2008), OS X El Capitan 10.11

Posted on Oct 11, 2015 10:28 AM

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89 replies

Jan 22, 2017 11:51 AM in response to Walmo

Apple user community - Not only can I not get my 2011 iMac 10.11.6 computer to accept 'KeyChain Pass Words', after trying to eliminate everything i.e. All PWs, and start from scratch, my Screen comes up with nothing except an 'admin' logo with a window that says "Enter Password". The only other option on the blue screen is to Cancel (X). Same appears when I 'Reboot'.


I've tried ever PW I've ever used on this machine and nothing works. Help!

Fred

chosenrescue82@gmail.com

Jan 22, 2017 12:02 PM in response to Motherfred82

Log in as admin user.

Go to System Preferences > Users & Groups

Do you see your original User?

If yes, it set as Standard and not Admin? If set to standard, you can assign it administrator permissions. Restart and you should see your User.

If no, then check in a Finder window under Users to see if you see the folder.


Macintosh HD Root folders

Applications

Library

System

Users > Your User <------


Note, you might need to reinstall Sierra over your install. You have not given enough info at this time to be more specific.


Download EtreCheck. (a utility by a respected member of this community) and post its report here, so we have a better idea of your hardware and software setup so we can better help.


http://www.etresoft.com/etrecheck

Oct 11, 2015 10:36 AM in response to Walmo

OS X Mavericks v10.9.1- Repeated prompts to unlock "Local Items" keychain

Tutorial: Resolving Keychain Issues


If you can't access your keychain, or forget your password If you can't get into your keychain file because you've forgotten your password or the keychain file appears to be corrupt, there are a couple of options.


First, if you've forgotten your password, you can use the "Keychain First Aid" utility to make the keychain password the same as the login password. This can be accomplished via the following process:


1. Open Keychain Access (located in Applications/Utilities)

2. Go to the "Keychain Access" menu and select "Preferences"

3. Click the "First Aid" tab

4. Make sure the "Synchronize login keychain password" box is checked

5. Close the Preferences window

6. Go to the "Keychain Access" menu and select "Keychain First Aid"

7. Enter your username and password

8. Click the "Repair" button


The second option is to completely delete your keychain then recreate it. This routine is useful if your keychain appears to be corrupt or otherwise inaccessible. This can be accomplished as follows:


1. Launch Keychain Access (located in Applications/Utilities)

2. Click "Show Keychains" in the lower-left corner of the window.

3. Select the problematic keychain from the left-hand pane.

4. Navigate to the "File" menu and select "Delete Keychain '(name of keychain)'"

5. Check all options for deletion and press "OK"

6. Create a new keychain by going to the "File" menu, then "New" and selecting

"New Keychain"

7. You can now make this keychain your default if you desire by selecting it, then

going to the "File" menu and selecting "Make '(name of keychain)' Default"


Login as root and perform repair In some cases, problems with keychains can only be resolved when logged in as the root user.


First, you want to enable the root user:


1. OS X Mountain Lion: Enable and disable the root user

2. OS X Lion: Enable and disable the root user

3. Mac OS X 10.6: Enabling the root user

4. Enabling and using the "root" user in Mac OS X


After enabling the root user, and logging in under this account, again open Keychain Access. First attempt repairs using Keychain First Aid, and failing that, delete then recreate the keychain as described above while logged in as root.


Persistently asked for stored passwords If you are persistently asked for passwords in various applications that you have specified should be remembered in a keychain, your "login" keychain may not be active for one reason or another.


Navigate to ~/Library/Keychains/ (this is the Library folder inside your user's home folder). Find the file named "login.keychain" and double-click it.


Failing that, select the "login" keychain within the Keychain Access application and make sure it is the default keychain by going to the "File" menu and selecting "Make 'Login' Default"


Turn off Keychain synchronization in applications having problems If specific applications are experiencing issues when accessing password-protected material, the Keychain may be to blame.


The above comes from an article published on MacFixit.com.

Oct 11, 2015 11:12 AM in response to Kappy

El Capitan loaded and terrible problems with key chain function.


Can't use my Mac Mini anymore, just disaster.


Error messages asking for password and if I enter the correct one, it does complain and asking again and again.


Horrible, who can help. (deleted key chain already and building up the new one, but suddenly, key chain goes into the same loop, asking for the PW)


Rolf

Oct 22, 2015 2:19 AM in response to Walmo

Exactly the same problem here :-(

MS Office 2016 stores a key within the key chain "login" when you activate Office 365 with MS Word. Starting Outlook 2016 tries to use the key but clicking "Allow" or "Always allow" has no effect, you have to click "Don´t Allow" 3x to proceed.

Open Key Chain and give access to everyone can't be saved with the same problem. Enter correct password and click "Allow" does not work.

Testet with OS X 10.11.1 and the latest MS Office 2016 15.15

Apple has to fix this soon!

Oct 23, 2015 5:54 PM in response to Kappy

Tried both. The "keychain repair" said that the keychain was repaired. But that was as far as I got. I even tried to perform functions with a new default keychain established. The pop ups wanting the keychain passwords continue.

Ever since installing El Capitan I have had other issues as well. System Preferences freezes up. I regret upgrading to it.

Oct 23, 2015 10:42 PM in response to rocknrollbsw

From yesterday started to receive messages "This Mac can’t connect to iCloud because of a problem with...." Password was accepted, but after 1 second asking again, again. again.... After entering password is possible to change something, but after half second iCloud menu greyed out and ask for password.

  1. Logged out iCloud, and back - without progress,
  2. Not accepted System Preferences password to unlock and finally not possible to edit something on settings, reset password also not working as use FileVault.
  3. Keychain First aid: Keychain can't be unlocked automatically. Please attempt to unlock ~/Library/Keychains/login.keychain from Keychain Access. Unable to change password for ~/Library/Keychains/login.keychain. Please change password using Edit > Change Password for Keychain. - is it ok?
  4. Reinstalled OSX El Capitan - no progress, still not possible to enter iCloud System Preferences. ask for password, but can unlock System preference menus.
  5. Deleted fresh created user account and created new - no progress - iCloud ask for password. If I enter iCloud under System Preferences, then for 1 second everything is fine, but after all greyed out und Message : Enter your password to continue using iCloud and button " Enter Password..." But on same time Mail is working, receiving messages.
  6. Unselected iCloud Keychain under System Preferences - nothing.
  7. Leave computer powered on by night - not helped.


Where is problem?

Oct 25, 2015 8:57 PM in response to Walmo

Since "upgrading" to El Capitan, everything that uses authentication (and thus Keychain) is now broken. I get prompted constantly that "Keychain 'login' cannot be found to store 'username@domain.com'" with two options, 1) Cancel and 2) Reset to Defaults.


When I choose 'Reset to Defaults' it prompts for keychain password, accepts it, and then proceeds to complain about it again. Doing this 5-6 times makes it stop for a while. I've completely removed all keychains and re-created from scratch, same problem. Once it is "fixed" it usually stays "fixed" until the next reboot at which point all is broken once again.


I am so sorry that I "upgraded" to what I hoped was a stable and tested OS - this clearly doesn't pass basic muster.

Oct 26, 2015 12:35 AM in response to fr33wh33lin

As fr33wh33lin explained in detail, this does still happen to my upgrade to el Capitan mac mini.


Keychain does ask for user and passwords, asking for keychain password several time.

MS 365 outlook still get blocked.

El Capitan does ask keychain password again and again.


Reinstalled El Capitain again, no changes. Deleted keychain and setup again, no changes.


I'm not happy at all about the latest SW change, still problems and no help.

Oct 26, 2015 7:42 AM in response to Charly B.

Definitely something goofy with MS Office and Keychain. It works perfectly fine in one of my Macs but on the other, I see that issue with Keychain asking for permission on startup. I cannot select Always Allow or Allow. On the Mac with the issue, I opened the Keychain entry (Kind: MicrosoftOffice15_2_Data...) and switched from Attributes tab to Access Control. Under "Always Allow Access by these applications", I saw Office365ServiceV2 first on the list, then Microsoft Word. On the Mac that works fine, I saw all Office applications with Office365ServiceV2 next to last on the list. I tried manually adding all applications to the Mac with the issue but when I try to save, I see Allow and Deny but Allow does not work.

keychain not working after El Capitan

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