+ /* This is effectively doing a new operation on the MAC_KEY and should be
+ * adequately guarded again modules' error states. However, both current
+ * calls here are guarded propery in signature/mac_legacy.c. Thus, it
+ * could be removed here. The concern is that something in the future
+ * might call this function without adequate guards. It's a cheap call,
+ * it seems best to leave it even though it is currently redundant.
+ */
+ if (!ossl_prov_is_running())
+ return 0;
+