Tagged Questions

3
votes
3answers
74 views

Storing config securely in a semi trusted shared hosting environment

I'm looking for a pattern to store a config file containing sensitive information in a semi trusted hosting environment. Semi trusted in this case meaning I trust them in general, but not with this ...
2
votes
2answers
205 views

How to secure a truecrypt container allowing access with multiple SSH public keys?

I would like to create a TrueCrypt container which can be accessed by multiple people. The container itself can be stored anywhere, e.g. in a shared folder in Dropbox or Google Drive, ... I would ...
3
votes
2answers
172 views

What are the differences between ssh generated keys(ssh-keygen) and OpenSSL keys (PEM)and what is more secure for ssh remote login?

I have learned there are 2 methods to make SSH remote login easier and secure , those are; ssh generated keys (using ssh-keygen)OpenSSH Keys PEM (.pem) keys usually generated with OpenSSL (Amazon ...
4
votes
1answer
270 views

Are SSH packets encrypted even before new keys are sent?

What format does SSH use to exchange (encrypted / plain) packets before new keys are derived? SSH Document says that after key exchange, client and server use negotiated algorithm to encrypt the ...
8
votes
5answers
960 views

Confusion: Why isn't a passhrase encrypted SSH key two factor auth?

I'm trying to figure out the best practices for accessing my devbox from a public terminal. Most sources I've found recommend protecting the box with some kind of two factor authentication, such as ...
2
votes
4answers
224 views

Can public keys be a security risk when performing password-less SSH logins?

Some companies use monitoring software such as nagios or icinga. In order to perform checks on the servers, they often need password-less SSH logins. The servers being checked put the public key of ...
3
votes
3answers
458 views

In the Diffie-Hellman key exchange, how is the shared base key 'p' known and how are A and B, protected from Eve?

I'm trying to wrap my head around Hellman, Diffie, and Merkle's key exchange design, but after reading the Wiki article about it, I can't figure out how the commonly known factor ('p', I think) comes ...
10
votes
3answers
547 views

Encryption-Laws in Iran

According to this article Iran has criminalized the usage of encryption and VPNs. According to this blog post it is still possible to use SSH tunnels in Iran. For me SSH is encryption and thus ...
5
votes
2answers
530 views

ssh public/private key pair

I am having problems understanding how ssh really works. I know it uses a public key cryptography to encrypt messages. However, I can ssh to a server without first generating a public/private key pair ...
4
votes
2answers
437 views

Which is the easiest secure file transport protocol to implement (SFTP, FTPS, HTTPS, FTP over SSH, FTP over IPsec)

I have to select a secure file transfer protocol, to be implemented in a pre-boot system. I have access to libraries with the basic network functionalities (IP, TCP, UDP, etc...). I might also have ...
5
votes
3answers
408 views

What is the difference between encrypted data and data sent through an encrypted tunnel

I am looking at different VPN protocols. [1] L2TP does not provide encryption so require IPSec to encrypt the data [2] IPSec tunnel provide encryption to the tunnel What is the difference in terms ...
79
votes
3answers
48k views

RSA vs. DSA for SSH authentication keys

When generating SSH authentication keys on a Unix/Linux system with ssh-keygen, you're given the choice of creating a RSA or DSA key pair (using -t type). What is the difference between RSA and DSA ...
8
votes
7answers
2k views

Why can an encrypted private key be brute forced?

When using SSH keys to authenticate to a server for remote access, why is it possible to devise the true key and therefore the passphrase from an encrypted private key, without checking each guess of ...
5
votes
2answers
344 views

How can I authenticate a client connection in a secure way?

Let's say I have a server listening on port 1234. I have some client software that needs to be able to connect to this port. But I want to prevent malicious users from bypassing the client software ...