Verifying SSH Host Fingerprints

Tuesday, January 10th, 2006

If you use ssh you’re familiar with this message:

~$ ssh rich.elharo.com
The authenticity of host 'rich.elharo.com (192.168.254.36)' can't be established.
RSA key fingerprint is 5a:65:0f:5f:21:bb:fd:6a:5a:68:cd:62:58:5d:fb:9f.
Are you sure you want to continue connecting (yes/no)?

If you’re like me, you regularly just type yes and continue without much thought:

Are you sure you want to continue connecting (yes/no)? yes
Warning: Permanently added ‘rich.elharo.com,192.168.254.36′ (RSA) to the list of known hosts.

But is that really safe? (more…)

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