Bug 474359

Summary: Cannot establish Wifi connection w/o passwords in clear text in the connection files
Product: [Applications] systemsettings Reporter: Thomas <t.schneider>
Component: kcm_networkmanagementAssignee: Plasma Bugs List <plasma-bugs-null>
Status: RESOLVED NOT A BUG    
Severity: normal CC: jgrulich, nate
Priority: NOR    
Version First Reported In: unspecified   
Target Milestone: ---   
Platform: Other   
OS: Linux   
Latest Commit: Version Fixed/Implemented In:
Sentry Crash Report:

Description Thomas 2023-09-10 10:03:35 UTC 
SUMMARY
***
By default, NetworkManager stores passwords in clear text in the connection files at /etc/NetworkManager/system-connections/. 
The passwords are accessible to the root user in the filesystem.
It is preferable to save the passwords in encrypted form in a keyring instead of clear text.
However after modifying connection settings to store passwords encrypted the connection fails.
***


STEPS TO REPRODUCE
1. click on a network connection
2. in the General configuration tab, untick All users may connect to this network
3. click on confirm

OBSERVED RESULT
no secrets: No agents were available for this request.

EXPECTED RESULT
Connections works w/o problems

SOFTWARE/OS VERSIONS
Linux/KDE Plasma: Kali Linux 2023.3
(available in About System)
KDE Plasma Version: 5.27.7
KDE Frameworks Version: 5.107.0
Qt Version: 5.15.10
Comment 1 Nate Graham 2023-09-11 18:52:58 UTC 
Networkmanager itself is not a KDE project and we cannot control its default settings.

plasma-nm, which is our GUI to interact with it, does exactly what you suggest: it defaults to saving passwords in our KWallet password keyring system.

If you're seeing something else, it's because your distro has misconfigured things. And in this case that's exactly what I suggest, because you're using Kali Linux which sets things up... creatively. :) As a result, I'm afraid Plasma is not eligible for support from KDE when run on Kali Linux.

If would like support from KDE for issues you encounter, I would encourage you to re-install your system with a more appropriate general-purpose Linux distro, such as one of the ones you can see at https://kde.org/distributions. If the issue still manifests after doing so, feel free to re-open this bug report.

Thanks for understanding!