Bug 2372

Summary:	Print warning when file permissions too loose for ssh key authentication
Product:	Portable OpenSSH	Reporter:	Andrew Pennebaker <andrew.pennebaker>
Component:	ssh	Assignee:	Assigned to nobody <unassigned-bugs>
Status:	CLOSED WORKSFORME
Severity:	enhancement	CC:	dtucker
Priority:	P5
Version:	6.8p1
Hardware:	68k
OS:	Mac OS X

Description Andrew Pennebaker 2015-03-26 02:07:25 AEDT

SSH key configuration is the bane of my existence. No matter how I check and double-check file permissions, there's always that one file or folder that I forget about, that silently triggers SSH ignoring my painstakingly configured SSH key setup, dropping me into a password authentication prompt.

In the future, could ssh please display a warning about the file or folder with improper permissions when attempting key-based authentication? It would really help out newbies.

Comment 1 Darren Tucker 2015-04-15 15:31:43 AEST

This was added a while ago.  For OpenSSH clients they're shown at loglevel "debug" and higher.

https://anongit.mindrot.org/openssh.git/commit/?id=48147d6801be6b9158c4bcedce6c67b0d591d642

queue auth debug messages for bad ownership or permissions on the user's
keyfiles. These messages will be sent after the user has successfully
authenticated (where our client will display them with LogLevel=debug

Comment 2 Darren Tucker 2015-04-17 11:12:20 AEST

Closing because of the aforementioned change.  Please reopen if you can demonstrate conditions under which the information is not sent and we'll see if we can fix it.

Thanks.

Comment 3 Damien Miller 2016-08-02 10:40:50 AEST

Close all resolved bugs after 7.3p1 release