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How to Log in to Eenos Webmail as Server Admin

Overview

By design, the Eenos Control Panel does not allow server administrators or website owners to directly log into individual user email accounts.
This privacy-first approach ensures that user communications remain secure and confidential — unlike some other control panels that permit admin access to personal mailboxes without the user’s consent.

This strict privacy policy is one of the key reasons many users choose to migrate to Eenos.

Why You Might Need to Access End-User Emails

In certain situations, technical support teams or server administrators may need to log in to end-user mailboxes for testing or troubleshooting.
For example:

  • To verify if an email account can send or receive messages properly.

  • To test authentication or delivery issues.

  • To debug specific client-side or server-side email problems.

Requesting or resetting user passwords is not ideal in these cases.
Instead, a Dovecot Master Account allows temporary administrative access to any mailbox for troubleshooting — without altering user credentials.

Enabling a Master Password for Dovecot (Eenos Mail Server)

The Eenos email system uses the Dovecot mail server for authentication and mail delivery.
Dovecot supports a master user mechanism that allows a privileged account to access any mailbox by appending the master username to the login string

Eenos does not provide any built-in option in the control panel for this configuration.
You can enable it manually on the server using the steps below.

Step 1: Modify the Master User Configuration

Edit the file /etc/dovecot/conf.d/auth-master.conf.ext and add the following configuration:

# Authentication for master users. Included from 10-auth.conf.
# Define the separator used between the normal username and the master username.

auth_master_user_separator = +

passdb {
  driver = passwd-file
  master = yes
  args = /etc/dovecot/master-users

  # Ensure successful continuation of authentication
  result_success = continue
}

Step 2: Include the Master Auth File in Dovecot

Open /etc/dovecot/conf.d/10-auth.conf And include the master configuration file by adding:

# uncomment the following line
!include auth-master.conf.ext

Step 3: Create the Master User File

Use the htpasswd Command to create the master user credentials:

htpasswd -c -s /etc/dovecot/master-users masterusername
chmod 640 /etc/dovecot/master-users
chown dovecot:dovecot /etc/dovecot/master-users

Step 4: Restart Dovecot Service

Apply the changes by restarting the Dovecot service:

systemctl restart dovecot

Step 5: Log in to Webmail Using the Master Account

Once configured, you can log in to any mailbox using the following format:

  • Webmail URL: https://mail.example.com

  • Username: user@example.com+masterusername

  • Password: master account password

This lets the master account access the user’s mailbox without needing their individual password.

Conclusion

The Dovecot Master Account feature provides a secure, temporary way to troubleshoot email issues on Eenos mail servers.

Security Tip:
Always secure the /etc/dovecot/master-users file, and remove the master account once troubleshooting is complete.
Leaving a master account enabled indefinitely may pose a security risk.