diff --git a/configure.ac b/configure.ac
index 18132757cd..545f1fb586 100644
--- a/configure.ac
+++ b/configure.ac
@@ -583,7 +583,7 @@ AC_CHECK_FUNC(
 )
 
 AC_CHECK_FUNCS(prctl mallinfo getpass closefrom getpwnam_r getgrnam_r getpwuid_r)
-AC_CHECK_FUNCS(fmemopen funopen mmap memrchr setlinebuf strptime)
+AC_CHECK_FUNCS(fmemopen funopen mmap memrchr setlinebuf strptime dirfd)
 
 AC_CHECK_FUNC([syslog], [
 	AC_DEFINE([HAVE_SYSLOG], [], [have syslog(3) and friends])
diff --git a/src/libstrongswan/utils/utils.c b/src/libstrongswan/utils/utils.c
index c396540ec2..b4a4db8024 100644
--- a/src/libstrongswan/utils/utils.c
+++ b/src/libstrongswan/utils/utils.c
@@ -175,10 +175,19 @@ void closefrom(int low_fd)
 	DIR *dir;
 	struct dirent *entry;
 
+#ifndef HAVE_DIRFD
+	/* if we don't have dirfd() lets close the lowest FD and hope it gets reused
+	 * by opendir() */
+	close(low_fd);
+	dir_fd = low_fd++;
+#endif
+
 	dir = opendir(FD_DIR);
 	if (dir)
 	{
+#ifdef HAVE_DIRFD
 		dir_fd = dirfd(dir);
+#endif
 		while ((entry = readdir(dir)))
 		{
 			if (!isdigit(entry->d_name[0]))