Mac Verify Error: Invalid Password? Often It Isn't
Mac verify error: invalid password? is the line OpenSSL prints when it can't check a .p12 or .pfx file's integrity code. The question mark is doing a lot of work. I built 11 PKCS#12 files on a Mac mini running macOS 26.4.1 and opened them with the two OpenSSL builds on this machine and with security import. The message showed up for a wrong password, which is expected. It also showed up for the right password in three cases: a file made with OpenSSL 3.4's new PBMAC1 option, a file whose password contained non-ASCII letters, and a file with no MAC at all. Keychain's version of the same lie is The user name or passphrase you entered is not correct, and it said that for every empty-password file I gave it, no matter what password I passed.
First, the word "Mac". It isn't the computer. In PKCS#12, the MAC is a message authentication code: a keyed hash over the file's contents, keyed from your password. When the hash doesn't match, the tool can't tell whether the password was wrong or whether it computed the hash with the wrong recipe, so it guesses "invalid password?".
Two openssl commands on one Mac
A stock Mac has /usr/bin/openssl, which reports LibreSSL 3.3.6 on 26.4.1. Homebrew's openssl@3 on this machine reports OpenSSL 3.6.4 25 Aug 2026. Which one runs depends on your PATH, and they write different files from the same command. With openssl pkcs12 -export -passout pass:secret123, -info showed:
- LibreSSL 3.3.6: MAC
sha1, salt 8 bytes, certificates encrypted withpbeWithSHA1And40BitRC2-CBC. - OpenSSL 3.6.4: MAC
sha256, salt 16 bytes, everything encrypted withPBES2, PBKDF2, AES-256-CBC.
The 16-byte salt is new in 3.6; the openssl-pkcs12 manual notes the default moved from 8. That alone didn't break anything in my tests. The algorithms are what break things. The YubiKey SSH on Mac post hit the same split from the other side: the bundled OpenSSH is linked against that same LibreSSL 3.3.6.
The matrix
I read four files with both tools, using the right password, a wrong one, and an empty one (-passin pass:): 24 reads. Then I imported all 11 files into a throwaway keychain with security import -f pkcs12 -P, with the right password and, for nine of them, an empty one too.
| File (made by) | LibreSSL 3.3.6, right password | OpenSSL 3.6.4, right password | security import, right password |
|---|---|---|---|
| Default export (LibreSSL) | OK | MAC OK, then unsupported RC2-40-CBC | OK |
-legacy export (OpenSSL 3) | OK | MAC OK, then unsupported RC2-40-CBC | OK |
| Default export (OpenSSL 3) | OK | OK | OK |
-pbmac1_pbkdf2 (OpenSSL 3) | Mac verify error | OK | passphrase not correct |
Password pässwörd (OpenSSL 3) | Mac verify error | OK | passphrase not correct |
Password pässwörd (LibreSSL) | OK | "using broken algorithm", then RC2 error | OK |
| Empty password (3 files) | OK with pass: | OK with pass: | passphrase not correct (all 3, any password) |
-nomac (OpenSSL 3) | Mac verify error (mac absent) | "MAC is absent" warning, reads | Unable to decode the provided data |
Every wrong-password read in the 24 gave Mac verify error: invalid password? and exit 1, as it should. The bold cells are where the password was right and the message still blamed it. The -nomac row isn't in those 24 reads; I checked it separately. LibreSSL printed the same first line for it, with mac absent underneath.
PBMAC1: the right password, rejected
OpenSSL 3.4 added -pbmac1_pbkdf2, which writes the MAC the way RFC 9579 describes (PBMAC1 with PBKDF2). It isn't the default in 3.6, but anything that sets it produces a file LibreSSL can't verify. With the correct password, LibreSSL printed the usual first line, and the real cause was two lines below:
$ /usr/bin/openssl pkcs12 -in pbmac1.p12 -nodes -passin pass:secret123
Mac verify error: invalid password?
...:error:23FFF076:PKCS12 routines:CRYPTO_internal:unknown digest algorithm:...p12_mutl.c:97:
...:error:23FFF06D:PKCS12 routines:CRYPTO_internal:mac generation error:...p12_mutl.c:132:A wrong password prints only the first line. If you see unknown digest algorithm under it, the password isn't the problem. Keychain gave no such hint: SecKeychainItemImport: The user name or passphrase you entered is not correct.
Non-ASCII passwords are encoded two ways
PKCS#12 converts the password to a 16-bit string before hashing it. OpenSSL 3 treats your bytes as UTF-8. LibreSSL 3.3.6 behaves as if it converts each byte on its own: OpenSSL 3 could open the LibreSSL file only through a fallback it announces as Warning: using broken algorithm. So a password with ä or ö produces a different key in each tool. LibreSSL has no such fallback, so it rejects the OpenSSL 3 file. Keychain also rejected the OpenSSL 3 file and accepted the LibreSSL one, so on this Mac it behaves like LibreSSL here. An ASCII-only password avoids the whole question.
Keychain and empty passwords
Exporting with -passout pass: makes a file both openssl builds open with -passin pass:. That's also the answer in one of the Stack Overflow threads on this error: the file may simply have no password. security import refused all three empty-password files I made (LibreSSL, OpenSSL 3 default, OpenSSL 3 -legacy), with -P "" and with a real password. If the file is going into Keychain, give it a password.
Tell a wrong password from a wrong algorithm
-nomacver skips the integrity check and goes straight to decrypting. Decryption uses the same password, so the result tells you which side failed. On the PBMAC1 file, LibreSSL with -nomacver and the right password printed the private key and exited 0. With a wrong password it failed with bad decrypt. OpenSSL 3.6.4 behaved the same way on its default file.
# 1. Which openssl am I running?
openssl version
# 2. What MAC and ciphers does the file use?
/opt/homebrew/opt/openssl@3/bin/openssl pkcs12 -in cert.p12 -info -noout
# 3. Is the password right? Keys out = yes, "bad decrypt" = no.
openssl pkcs12 -in cert.p12 -nodes -nomacver -passin 'pass:YOURPASSWORD' | grep -c 'BEGIN PRIVATE KEY'Step 2 needs OpenSSL 3. LibreSSL's -info prints only MAC Iteration 2048 and no algorithm names. Use -nomacver only for diagnosis on a file you trust: it turns off the check that the file wasn't altered.
Once you know the password is right, re-export the file in the format the reader expects:
# Convert to PEM with the tool that can read it, then repackage
/opt/homebrew/opt/openssl@3/bin/openssl pkcs12 -in cert.p12 -nodes -passin 'pass:OLD' -out tmp.pem
/opt/homebrew/opt/openssl@3/bin/openssl pkcs12 -export -in tmp.pem -out fixed.p12 -passout 'pass:NEWASCII'
rm tmp.pemThat pair turned the empty-password file into one security import accepted, exit 0. Add -legacy to the second command if the reader is LibreSSL-era software or a Mac older than macOS 15. tmp.pem holds the unencrypted private key, so delete it.
Keychain on macOS 26 vs what the forums say
Most posts about this say Macs can't import OpenSSL 3 files. That was true on older systems. In an Apple Developer Forums thread from April 2025, Apple DTS said macOS 15 added support for the newer algorithms, and that the security command still failed on macOS 15.4 (bug FB17330275). A December 2025 thread reports the same files failing on macOS 14.8.2 and importing on 15.x and 26.x. A 2023 VoltBuilder forum thread got the same error for iOS signing and solved it with -legacy. On 26.4.1, security import accepted the OpenSSL 3.6.4 default file (SHA-256 MAC, AES-256) on the first try. I didn't test macOS 14 or 15. For those, Apple's answer is still -legacy.
The other Stack Overflow answers in that set name causes this test didn't produce but are worth ruling out: a password file with Windows line endings, and special characters the shell ate before openssl saw them. Quote the whole 'pass:...' argument in single quotes. LibreSSL being an older fork shipped as openssl is part of a pattern: macOS also ships openrsync as rsync. To find out which keychain entry a lookup actually returns, see find-generic-password with multiple entries.
FAQ
What does Mac verify error invalid password mean?
MAC stands for message authentication code, not the Mac computer. OpenSSL computed the PKCS#12 file's integrity hash from the password you gave and it didn't match. The usual cause is a wrong or missing password, but it also appears with the correct password when the reader doesn't support the file's MAC algorithm (PBMAC1 in LibreSSL), the file has no MAC, or the reader encodes non-ASCII passwords differently.
How do I know if my p12 password is actually wrong?
Run the same command with -nomacver added, for example openssl pkcs12 -in cert.p12 -nodes -nomacver -passin 'pass:YOURPASSWORD'. If the private key prints, the password is correct and the MAC format is the problem. If it fails with bad decrypt, the password is wrong. Use -nomacver only to diagnose a file you trust, because it skips the tamper check.
Why won't Keychain import my OpenSSL 3 p12 file?
On macOS 14 and earlier, Keychain can't read the SHA-256 MAC and AES-256 encryption that OpenSSL 3 uses by default, so export with -legacy. On macOS 26.4.1, security import accepted the OpenSSL 3.6.4 default file, but it rejected files with an empty password, files made with -pbmac1_pbkdf2 or -nomac, and OpenSSL 3 files with non-ASCII passwords. Re-export with a plain ASCII password.
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Method: all tests ran on 2026-10-09 between 18:04 and 18:20 KST on a Mac mini M4 (Mac16,10, macOS 26.4.1 build 25E253) over SSH, as a normal user. A throwaway self-signed RSA-2048 certificate was exported 11 ways with /usr/bin/openssl (LibreSSL 3.3.6) and Homebrew OpenSSL 3.6.4. Reads used -nodes with -passin, and exit codes and PRIVATE KEY lines were counted. Imports went into a temporary keychain created and deleted for the test; the login keychain search list was unchanged. The Stack Overflow questions were the three returned by a Stack Exchange API title search for "Mac verify error", and their answers were read through the API. I didn't test macOS 14 or 15, Keychain Access drag-and-drop, SecPKCS12Import from code, or Windows readers.