diff -ruN cfengine-2.1.0b3.org/src/init.c cfengine-2.1.0b3/src/init.c
--- cfengine-2.1.0b3.org/src/init.c	2003-10-12 20:32:17.000000000 +0200
+++ cfengine-2.1.0b3/src/init.c	2003-10-12 20:36:46.000000000 +0200
@@ -167,7 +167,7 @@
    snprintf(VBUFF,bufsize,"%s/ppkeys/test",VLOCKDIR);
    MakeDirectoriesFor(VBUFF,'n');
    snprintf(VBUFF,bufsize,"%s/ppkeys",VLOCKDIR); 
-   chmod(VBUFF,(mode_t)0700); /* Locks must be immutable to others */    
+   chmod(VBUFF,(mode_t)0700); /* Keys must be immutable to others */    
    }
 else
    {
@@ -180,7 +180,10 @@
 
 Verbose("Making sure that locks are private...\n"); 
 chown(VLOCKDIR,getuid(),getgid());
-chmod(VLOCKDIR,(mode_t)0755); /* Locks must be immutable to others */
+if (stat(VLOCKDIR,&statbuf) != -1) {
+  /* Locks must be immutable to others */
+  chmod(VLOCKDIR,(mode_t)(statbuf.st_mode & ~022)); /* change permissions go-w */
+}
 }
 
 /**********************************************************************/