SSH Keys - Upload Only
- Posted by John Bazik
- on Aug. 18, 2022
Beginning Thursday, August 25, the CS department SSH gateway and FastX servers will only honor SSH keys uploaded via the CS website. SSH keys stored on the CS department filesystem, in user home directories, will not permit access after that date. If you have not uploaded keys you are currently using, you will not be able to reach the department via SSH until you do.
Our SSH service requires that users generate SSH key pairs: one private and one public. Usually the public key is appended to the user's authorized_keys file, located in their home directory, in the .ssh subdirectory. Then the client machine, on which the key pair was generated, is allowed remote SSH access to CS department machines.
A year ago, we introduced a web application with which CS users can instead upload and manage their public keys. For the past year, we have merged uploaded keys with those already present on the filesystem, and installed the combined authorized_keys file on our SSH gateway and FastX servers.
On August 25, we will stop merging these keys and only keys uploaded to the website will be installed on the SSH gateway and FastX servers. This is being done to improve the security and maintenance of our remote access gateways.