diff --git a/internal/httpapi/auth_test.go b/internal/httpapi/auth_test.go
index b4d7ba4..5a1e73f 100644
--- a/internal/httpapi/auth_test.go
+++ b/internal/httpapi/auth_test.go
@@ -686,3 +686,78 @@ func mustHash(t *testing.T, password string) string {
 	}
 	return hash
 }
+
+// A database that cannot be read must not look like a failed login.
+//
+// authenticate() cannot tell the two apart on its own: both come back as an error
+// from the session lookup. Answering 401 for both means a disk problem presents as
+// every session ending at once — the frontend clears its state and shows the
+// sign-in screen to everybody — and the logs record a wave of failed logins rather
+// than the fault. Found by the end-to-end suite, where a deleted database file
+// turned into exactly that.
+func TestDatabaseFailureIsNotALogout(t *testing.T) {
+	ts := newTestServer(t)
+	ts.bootstrap(t)
+
+	// Still signed in, and the session cookie is in the jar.
+	resp, _ := ts.do(t, "GET", "/api/v1/auth/me", nil)
+	if resp.StatusCode != http.StatusOK {
+		t.Fatalf("me: status %d", resp.StatusCode)
+	}
+
+	// Pull the database out from under the server. Every query now fails with
+	// something that is not "no such session".
+	if err := ts.db.Close(); err != nil {
+		t.Fatalf("close db: %v", err)
+	}
+
+	resp, body := ts.do(t, "GET", "/api/v1/auth/me", nil)
+	if resp.StatusCode == http.StatusUnauthorized {
+		t.Fatal("a broken database signed the user out instead of reporting a fault")
+	}
+	if resp.StatusCode != http.StatusInternalServerError {
+		t.Errorf("status %d, want 500", resp.StatusCode)
+	}
+	if body["code"] != CodeInternal {
+		t.Errorf("code = %v, want %q", body["code"], CodeInternal)
+	}
+}
+
+// The other half of the same contract: no cookie at all is still a plain 401.
+func TestMissingCredentialsAreStillUnauthorized(t *testing.T) {
+	ts := newTestServer(t)
+	ts.bootstrap(t)
+
+	anonymous := &testServer{Server: ts.Server, db: ts.db, client: newJarClient(t)}
+	resp, body := anonymous.do(t, "GET", "/api/v1/auth/me", nil)
+	if resp.StatusCode != http.StatusUnauthorized {
+		t.Errorf("status %d, want 401", resp.StatusCode)
+	}
+	if body["code"] != CodeUnauthorized {
+		t.Errorf("code = %v, want %q", body["code"], CodeUnauthorized)
+	}
+}
+
+// And a cookie that is not a session is a 401 too, not a 500 — an unknown token is
+// a wrong credential, which is the client's problem and not the server's.
+func TestUnknownSessionTokenIsUnauthorized(t *testing.T) {
+	ts := newTestServer(t)
+	ts.bootstrap(t)
+
+	req, err := http.NewRequest("GET", ts.URL+"/api/v1/auth/me", nil)
+	if err != nil {
+		t.Fatal(err)
+	}
+	req.AddCookie(&http.Cookie{Name: "verdande_session", Value: "ikke-en-rigtig-token"})
+	req.Header.Set("Sec-Fetch-Site", "same-origin")
+
+	resp, err := (&http.Client{}).Do(req)
+	if err != nil {
+		t.Fatal(err)
+	}
+	defer resp.Body.Close()
+
+	if resp.StatusCode != http.StatusUnauthorized {
+		t.Errorf("status %d, want 401", resp.StatusCode)
+	}
+}
diff --git a/internal/httpapi/middleware.go b/internal/httpapi/middleware.go
index 5668246..477cdb4 100644
--- a/internal/httpapi/middleware.go
+++ b/internal/httpapi/middleware.go
@@ -78,6 +78,14 @@ func (s *Server) requireAuth(next http.Handler) http.Handler {
 	return http.HandlerFunc(func(w http.ResponseWriter, r *http.Request) {
 		user, session, err := s.authenticate(r)
 		if err != nil {
+			// A database that could not be read is not a person who is not signed
+			// in. Answering 401 for both means an infrastructure problem shows up
+			// as everybody being logged out at once — the frontend clears its state
+			// and shows the sign-in screen — and nothing in the logs says why.
+			if !errors.Is(err, errNoCredentials) && !errors.Is(err, store.ErrNotFound) {
+				s.internal(w, "authenticate", err)
+				return
+			}
 			writeError(w, http.StatusUnauthorized, CodeUnauthorized, "not signed in")
 			return
 		}
@@ -123,6 +131,11 @@ func (s *Server) requireAdmin(next http.Handler) http.Handler {
 // Both are accepted everywhere. An API token belongs to a person and carries their
 // permissions exactly — there is no separate service identity to reason about, and
 // a script therefore cannot reach anything its owner could not.
+// errNoCredentials means the request carried nothing to authenticate with, as
+// opposed to carrying something that turned out to be wrong — or to the lookup
+// itself failing, which callers must not treat as a failed login.
+var errNoCredentials = errors.New("no credentials")
+
 func (s *Server) authenticate(r *http.Request) (*store.User, *store.Session, error) {
 	if token := bearerToken(r); token != "" && auth.IsAPIToken(token) {
 		user, err := s.db.UserByAPIToken(r.Context(), token)
@@ -134,7 +147,7 @@ func (s *Server) authenticate(r *http.Request) (*store.User, *store.Session, err
 
 	cookie, err := r.Cookie(s.cookieName())
 	if err != nil || cookie.Value == "" {
-		return nil, nil, errors.New("no credentials")
+		return nil, nil, errNoCredentials
 	}
 	session, user, err := s.db.SessionByToken(r.Context(), cookie.Value)
 	if err != nil {