SSH use only the password, Ignore the ssh key, don’t prompt me for a passphrase

authenticationpasswordssh

This is a question regarding the OpenSSH client on Linux, MacOSX and FreeBSD.

Normally, I log into systems using my SSH key.

Occasionally, I want my SSH client to ignore my SSH key and use a password instead. If I 'ssh hostname', my client prompts me for the Passphrase to my SSH key which is an annoyance. Instead, I want the client to simply ignore my SSH key, so that the server will ask me for my password instead.

I tried the following, but I am still prompted for the passphrase to my SSH key. After this, I am prompted for my password.

ssh -o PreferredAuthentications=password host.example.org

I want to do this on the client side, without any modification of the remote host.

Best Answer

Try ssh -o PasswordAuthentication=yes -o PreferredAuthentications=keyboard-interactive,password -o PubkeyAuthentication=no host.example.org

In ssh v2, keyboard-interactive is another way to say "password". The -o PubkeyAuthentication=no option instructs the client not to attempt key pair authentication.

In addition, the PasswordAuthentication=yes option is to override any previously configured ssh options that may have disabled it.

Related Solutions

Ssh – How to make ssh fail rather than prompt for a password if the public-key authentication fails

For OpenSSH there is BatchMode, which in addition to disabling password prompting, should disable querying for passphrase(s) for keys.

BatchMode

If set to “yes”, passphrase/password querying will be disabled. This option is useful in scripts and other batch jobs where no user is present to supply the password. The argument must be “yes” or “no”. The default is “no”.

Sample usage:

ssh -oBatchMode=yes -l <user> <host> <dostuff>

SSH Prompts for password even though private keys are available, presented to server and known to it

How is the user's home directory mounted? It sounds like, for whatever reason, the user's home directory is not available if the user is not logged in, so that sshd can't find the authorized_keys file.

Also, take a look at /var/log/auth.log on the server for any messages.

Update: if it's necessary to do password-less login, you can change the sshd_config file to look for authorzied_keys in a non-encrypted directory. http://www.openbsd.org/cgi-bin/man.cgi?query=sshd_config&sektion=5

I suppose something like this would work (not tested):

AuthorizedKeysFile /etc/ssh/pubkeys/%u/authorized_keys .ssh/authorized_keys

That should tell sshd to check for public keys in both the unencrypted location and the encrypted one. Check the man page for more info.

Best Answer

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Ssh – How to make ssh fail rather than prompt for a password if the public-key authentication fails

SSH Prompts for password even though private keys are available, presented to server and known to it

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