Security-scoped access to external-volume sync folders does not survive a reboot

[Snuffy2]

⚠️ Before submitting, please verify the following: ⚠️

• This is a bug, not a question or a configuration issue.
• This issue is not already reported on Github (I have searched for it).
• Nextcloud Server and Desktop Client are up to date. See Server Maintenance and Release Schedule and Desktop Releases for supported versions.
• I agree to follow Nextcloud's Code of Conduct

Bug description

Nextcloud Desktop repeatedly loses access to sync folders located on an external/local APFS volume after macOS is rebooted.

I grant access by opening Nextcloud Settings and selecting the affected folder through the “Grant Access” prompt. Synchronization then works normally. Quitting and reopening Nextcloud during the same macOS session also works.

However, after a full Mac reboot, Nextcloud cannot open its synchronization database or access the folder. I must open Settings and grant access to the exact same folder again. Access then works until the next reboot.

The client configuration contains non-empty securityScopedBookmarkData for the affected sync connection, including after access was granted. This suggests that the bookmark is being saved but cannot be restored after a reboot.

This is reproducible across multiple complete macOS reboots. It affects multiple sync connections located under /Volumes/ExternalDrive/.

Steps to reproduce

1. Install the official Nextcloud Desktop Client for macOS.
2. Attach or mount an APFS volume at /Volumes/ExternalDrive.
3. Create a folder such as:
   /Volumes/ExternalDrive/SyncFolder
4. Configure a Nextcloud sync connection using that folder as its local sync root.
5. When prompted, click “Grant Access” and select:
   /Volumes/ExternalDrive/SyncFolder
6. Confirm that synchronization starts and files under the folder are accessible.
7. Quit Nextcloud Desktop completely.
8. Reopen Nextcloud Desktop without rebooting macOS.
9. Confirm that the saved access normally works during the same boot session.
10. Reboot the Mac while leaving the volume connected.
11. Log in and allow Nextcloud Desktop to start.
12. Observe that the sync connection cannot access its database/folder and requires “Grant Access” again.
13. Open Nextcloud Settings and grant access to the exact same folder.
14. Observe that synchronization immediately starts working again.
15. Reboot once more and observe that the permission is lost again.

Additional reproduction example:

Configure two independent sync roots:

• /Volumes/ExternalDrive/SyncFolderA
• /Volumes/ExternalDrive/SyncFolderB

Grant access to both and confirm that they work. After rebooting macOS, both connections require access to be granted again.

Expected behavior

Granting access to an external-volume sync folder should create a persistent security-scoped bookmark.

After access has been granted once, Nextcloud Desktop should be able to restore that access following both:

• An ordinary Nextcloud Desktop restart
• A complete macOS restart

The user should not have to manually grant access to every sync folder after every reboot.

Which files are affected by this bug

/Volumes///.sync_.db

Operating system

macOS

Which version of the operating system you are running.

macOS 26 and 27 beta

Installation method

Official Installer for macOS 13 and later

Nextcloud Server version

34.0.3

Nextcloud Desktop Client version

34.0.2

Did this occur after an update or on a clean installation?

Clean desktop client installation

Are you using the Nextcloud Server Encryption module?

No

Are you using an external user-backend?

• Default internal user-backend
• LDAP or Active Directory
• SSO - SAML
• Other

Nextcloud Server logs

Additional info

Representative client error after a complete reboot:

Error: "unable to open database file" for "/Volumes/ExternalDrive/SyncFolder/.sync_<redacted>.db"

Representative successful message after manually granting access again:

Successfully started persistent access to security-scoped resource: "/Volumes/ExternalDrive/SyncFolder"

The securityScopedBookmarkData value remains present in the client configuration. An ordinary quit and relaunch during the same macOS boot can restore access successfully. The reproducible failure occurs across a full operating-system reboot.

The following may be related to the security-scoped bookmark failure.

The freshly downloaded official Nextcloud Desktop 34.0.2 package matched the SHA-256 digest published with the release. However, both the application extracted directly from that package and the installed application failed this verification:

$ codesign --verify --deep --strict --verbose=6 /Applications/Nextcloud.app
/Applications/Nextcloud.app: invalid signature (code or signature have been modified)
In architecture: arm64

This does not appear to be corruption limited to the local installation. It may be an official package-signing issue. macOS also reports that Nextcloud’s entitlements are being ignored because of the invalid signature or provisioning profile. It has not been confirmed whether this causes the security-scoped bookmark to fail across reboots.

Possibly related: #9865

macOS security logging also reports messages such as:

• Entitlement "NKUJUXUJ3B.com.nextcloud.desktopclient" is ignored because of an invalid application signature or incorrect provisioning profile
• code requirement check failed (-67050), client is not Apple-signed
• Client has neither com.apple.application-identifier nor com.apple.security.application-groups nor keychain-access-groups entitlements

Earlier issue #9480 describes the intended one-time security-scoped bookmark workflow. In this report, the bookmark remains saved, but access does not survive a full macOS reboot.

nextcloud_desktop_logs_2026_08_25-sanitized-48h.zip

nextcloud-sanitized-48h.log