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furiousteabag

Member

Registered: 2025-06-26

Posts: 10

[SOLVED] Connection activation failed: Secrets were required, but not

Hey everyone! On my new laptop, I started to get the error while trying to connect to new wireless networks:

nmcli d w c <name> password <password>:

Passwords or encryption keys are required to access the wireless network '<name>'.
Warning: password for '802-11-wireless-security.psk' not given in 'passwd-file' and nmcli cannot ask without '--ask' option.
Error: Connection activation failed: Secrets were required, but not provided.

Deleting the connection and connecting again doesn't work. Using --ask option puts me in the infinite loop of entering network password over and over. I have tried editing /etc/NetworkManager/NetworkManager.conf to:

[device]
wifi.scan-rand-mac-address=no

with no result.

For now, I can only connect to networks that I have previously connected to.

Logs:
sudo pacman -Qs: https://termbin.com/7uup
systemctl list-units --type=service --all: https://termbin.com/77rx
journalctl -b: https://termbin.com/nyvn

with the most relevant part being:

Jul 04 18:10:54 furiouspc kernel: wlan0: deauthenticated from 94:e3:ee:0b:0e:c8 (Reason: 15=4WAY_HANDSHAKE_TIMEOUT)
Jul 04 18:10:54 furiouspc wpa_supplicant[1107]: wlan0: CTRL-EVENT-DISCONNECTED bssid=94:e3:ee:0b:0e:c8 reason=15
Jul 04 18:10:54 furiouspc wpa_supplicant[1107]: wlan0: WPA: 4-Way Handshake failed - pre-shared key may be incorrect
Jul 04 18:10:54 furiouspc wpa_supplicant[1107]: wlan0: CTRL-EVENT-SSID-TEMP-DISABLED id=0 ssid="olirio.aiolfi" auth_failures=1 duration=10 reason=WRONG_KEY
Jul 04 18:10:54 furiouspc wpa_supplicant[1107]: wlan0: Added BSSID 94:e3:ee:0b:0e:c8 into ignore list, ignoring for 10 seconds
Jul 04 18:10:54 furiouspc wpa_supplicant[1107]: wlan0: CTRL-EVENT-REGDOM-CHANGE init=CORE type=WORLD
Jul 04 18:10:54 furiouspc wpa_supplicant[1107]: wlan0: CTRL-EVENT-REGDOM-CHANGE init=CORE type=WORLD
Jul 04 18:10:54 furiouspc NetworkManager[1067]: <info>  [1751663454.3495] device (wlan0): supplicant interface state: 4way_handshake -> disconnected
Jul 04 18:10:54 furiouspc NetworkManager[1067]: <info>  [1751663454.3496] device (wlan0): Activation: (wifi) disconnected during association, asking for new key
Jul 04 18:10:54 furiouspc NetworkManager[1067]: <info>  [1751663454.3498] device (wlan0): state change: config -> need-auth (reason 'supplicant-disconnect', managed-type: 'full')
Jul 04 18:10:54 furiouspc NetworkManager[1067]: <info>  [1751663454.3501] device (p2p-dev-wlan0): supplicant management interface state: 4way_handshake -> disconnected
Jul 04 18:10:54 furiouspc NetworkManager[1067]: <warn>  [1751663454.3554] device (wlan0): no secrets: No agents were available for this request.
Jul 04 18:10:54 furiouspc NetworkManager[1067]: <info>  [1751663454.3554] device (wlan0): state change: need-auth -> failed (reason 'no-secrets', managed-type: 'full')
Jul 04 18:10:54 furiouspc NetworkManager[1067]: <info>  [1751663454.3556] manager: NetworkManager state is now DISCONNECTED
Jul 04 18:10:54 furiouspc NetworkManager[1067]: <warn>  [1751663454.3557] device (wlan0): Activation: failed for connection 'olirio.aiolfi'
Jul 04 18:10:54 furiouspc NetworkManager[1067]: <info>  [1751663454.3559] device (wlan0): state change: failed -> disconnected (reason 'none', managed-type: 'full')

Any help/guidance appreciated. Happy to provide more logs if needed.

Last edited by furiousteabag (2025-07-07 09:43:03)

unixman

Member

Registered: 2015-03-12

Posts: 115

Re: [SOLVED] Connection activation failed: Secrets were required, but not

seems nmcli cant read your tty.
put yourself to tty group.
try as 'root'.
try wpa_cli.

maybe you are on /dev/console.
to check:

tty

nb:wpa_cli conflict with networkmanager.
to able to use wpa_cli you have to kill all nm processes/stop related services.
Then start wpa_supplicant service in the backgound.

seth

Member

Registered: 2012-09-03

Posts: 66,079

Re: [SOLVED] Connection activation failed: Secrets were required, but not

put yourself to tty group.
try as 'root'.

nmcli is supposed to work as regular user (otherwise you'd not need a NM daemon itfp) and when you feel the need to add yourself to tty that means your session is broken

ls -l /dev/tty*

Jul 04 18:10:35 furiouspc systemd[1]: Started Getty on tty1.

Are you starting a GUI session w/ startx/xinit or is this all on the console?
Cause

Jul 04 18:10:38 furiouspc dbus-broker-launch[1131]: Service file '/usr/share/dbus-1/services/org.knopwob.dunst.service' is not named after the D-Bus name 'org.freedesktop.Notifications'.

In the latter case, please post your xinitrc (and see the last link below)

Using --ask option puts me in the infinite loop of entering network password over and over.

Jul 04 18:10:54 furiouspc wpa_supplicant[1107]: wlan0: CTRL-EVENT-SSID-TEMP-DISABLED id=0 ssid="olirio.aiolfi" auth_failures=1 duration=10 reason=WRONG_KEY

Have you tried entering the key w/ some echo (ie where you can see what you actually type)?

---

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unixman

Member

Registered: 2015-03-12

Posts: 115

Re: [SOLVED] Connection activation failed: Secrets were required, but not

good morning seth. you are great:)

furiousteabag

Member

Registered: 2025-06-26

Posts: 10

Re: [SOLVED] Connection activation failed: Secrets were required, but not

I am on a GUI session, my .xinitrc:

#!/bin/sh
#
# Initializes X session and starts some useful daemons.

prefix="/usr"
exec_prefix="${prefix}"
xrdb="xrdb"
xinitdir="/etc/X11/xinit"
xmodmap="xmodmap"

userresources="$HOME/.Xresources"
usermodmap="$HOME/.Xmodmap"
sysresources="$xinitdir/.Xresources"
sysmodmap="$xinitdir/.Xmodmap"

# merge in defaults and keymaps

if [ -f "$sysresources" ]; then
    if [ -x /usr/bin/cpp ] ; then
        "$xrdb" -merge "$sysresources"
    else
        "$xrdb" -nocpp -merge "$sysresources"
    fi
fi

if [ -f "$sysmodmap" ]; then
    "$xmodmap" "$sysmodmap"
fi

if [ -f "$userresources" ]; then
    if [ -x /usr/bin/cpp ] ; then
        "$xrdb" -merge "$userresources"
    else
        "$xrdb" -nocpp -merge "$userresources"
    fi
fi

if [ -f "$usermodmap" ]; then
    "$xmodmap" "$usermodmap"
fi

if [ -d "$xinitdir"/xinitrc.d ] ; then
	for f in "$xinitdir/xinitrc.d"/?*.sh ; do
		[ -x "$f" ] && . "$f"
	done
	unset f
fi

########################################
## Daemons.
########################################
picom &                # Composite manager for transparency.
unclutter &            # Remove mouse cursor.
dunst &                # Notification manager.
udiskie -a -n &        # Automount manager.
flameshot &            # Screenshot tool.
nm-applet --no-agent & # Network manager icon w/o notification on connections.
lxqt-policykit-agent & # Authorize as root via GUI.
libinput-gestures-setup start & # Start gestures service.
xbindkeys &            # Keybinds from .xbindkeysrc
# aw-qt &                # Activity watch tool.

########################################
## Presets.
########################################
# setbg # Setting background.
xwallpaper --daemon --zoom ~/.config/wall.png # Redraw wallpaper on screen change.

#######################################
# Starting session.
#######################################
# xrandr --output eDP-1-1 --auto

exec i3

I've tried --ask with echo, but got the same result:

echo <password> | nmcli d w c olirio.aiolfi --ask

Passwords or encryption keys are required to access the wireless network 'olirio.aiolfi'.
Password (802-11-wireless-security.psk): ••••••••••••
Passwords or encryption keys are required to access the wireless network 'olirio.aiolfi'.
Password (802-11-wireless-security.psk): ••••••••••••
Passwords or encryption keys are required to access the wireless network 'olirio.aiolfi'.
Password (802-11-wireless-security.psk): ••••••••••••
Passwords or encryption keys are required to access the wireless network 'olirio.aiolfi'.
Password (802-11-wireless-security.psk): ••••••••••••
Passwords or encryption keys are required to access the wireless network 'olirio.aiolfi'.
Password (802-11-wireless-security.psk): ••••••••••••
Passwords or encryption keys are required to access the wireless network 'olirio.aiolfi'.
Password (802-11-wireless-security.psk): ••••••••••••
Error: nmcli terminated by signal Interrupt (2)

seth

Member

Registered: 2012-09-03

Posts: 66,079

Re: [SOLVED] Connection activation failed: Secrets were required, but not

xinitrc looks mostly fine (is wrt session integrity and there're no forked setxkbmap calls either) except:

nm-applet --no-agent & # Network manager icon w/o notification on connections.

looks prone to trip NM.
What if you start that w/o "--no-agent" or not at all?

---

How to upload text · How to boot w/o GUI · Disable Windows Fast-Start! · Fix your xinitrc

furiousteabag

Member

Registered: 2025-06-26

Posts: 10

Re: [SOLVED] Connection activation failed: Secrets were required, but not

I tried again and it was the dumbest thing on earth: wrong password... Had a typo of a similar symbol and didn't notice. Thank you for your attention. Marking as solved.