Disable password authentication on SSH server on OS X Server 10.8

Question

I want to disable the password authentication of the SSH server on my OS X Server. this should be done in /etc/sshd_config, right? But I’m not sure which setting I should change…

it still doesn’t work. I don’t know, what I do wrong. Should I post any configs? — Sebastian Semmler, Jun 14 '13 at 12:36

score 14 · Accepted Answer · edited May 23 '17 at 12:40

14

As any BSD system you should toggle off some options in your sshd_config like I've described in this Stack Overflow answer:

UsePam yes # it will not be used
ChallengeResponseAuthentication no
PasswordAuthentication no
kbdInteractiveAuthentication no

edited May 23 '17 at 12:40

Community

1

answered Mar 07 '13 at 08:53

Eir Nym

1,519
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I can’t find kbdInteractiveAutentication. The options have a # at the beginning of the line. Should I remove them? – Sebastian Semmler Mar 07 '13 at 11:46
the # sign before lines tells about default values. kbdInteractiveAutentication seems to be deprecated but may be used. – Eir Nym Mar 07 '13 at 12:32
@SebastianSemmler is this answer is helpful for you? – Eir Nym Mar 09 '13 at 22:56
no, still can login via password – Sebastian Semmler Mar 13 '13 at 11:41
2

You have to restart remote login – Eir Nym Mar 13 '13 at 15:52
I am somewhat annoyed to discover that my upgrade to Yosemite caused sshd_config to have commented out the modifications I made to it (modifications similar to this) -- what about kbdInteractiveAuthentication? Should I add it or not? – Steven Lu Dec 31 '14 at 08:51

score 2 · Answer 2 · answered Jan 15 '15 at 03:10

2

In case it helps, I was having trouble with this on 10.10 (Yosemite) and it turned out I was editing the wrong file. /etc/sshd_config is the right one, not /etc/ssh/sshd_config, which is what I was trying based on what man sshd_config says:

SSHD_CONFIG(5)              BSD File Formats Manual             SSHD_CONFIG(5)

NAME
     sshd_config -- OpenSSH SSH daemon configuration file

SYNOPSIS
     /etc/ssh/sshd_config

DESCRIPTION
     sshd(8) reads configuration data from /etc/ssh/sshd_config ...

answered Jan 15 '15 at 03:10

Owen

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Since 10.11 `/etc/ssh/sshd_config` - right path – Maxim Kholyavkin Oct 27 '15 at 12:16
@Speakus this was a problem for me, as upgrading to 10.11 meant that password authentication was reenabled and I didn't catch it for a couple months. – krs013 Dec 01 '15 at 21:59

Disable password authentication on SSH server on OS X Server 10.8

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