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Jan 14, 2015  How To Use Pageant to Streamline SSH Key Authentication with PuTTY Posted January 14, 2015 219.2k views Miscellaneous. By Saleh Mohsen. A tool to generate and edit SSH public and private key pairs. It is part of the PuTTY suite, but it can also operate with the private key formats used by some other SSH clients like WinSCP. Chapter 5: Using PSCP to transfer files securely PSCP, the PuTTY Secure Copy client, is a tool for transferring files securely between computers using an SSH connection. If you have an SSH-2 server, you might prefer PSFTP (see chapter 6 ) for interactive use. Using putty to scp from windows to Linux. Use scp privkey.pem source user@host. Browse other questions tagged linux windows ssh putty scp or ask your own.

Scp copy directory to another server with private key auth. Ask Question. Putty doesn't use openssh key files - there is a utility in putty suite to convert them. Maybe could be this issue - that you need to convert the keys (answered already here): How to convert SSH keypairs generated using PuttyGen(Windows) into key-pairs used by ssh. The PuTTY key generator dialog box will appear on the screen. In the dialog ‘Generate’ button will appear. Click on it to generate the key. Private and public keys for PuTTY can be generated. Choose the key with its strength and press the ‘Generate’ button than PuTTY starts generating the key.

PuTTYgen is a key generator. It generates pairs of public and private keys to be used with WinSCP. PuTTYgen generates RSA, DSA, ECDSA, and Ed25519 keys.

PuTTYgen is included in the WinSCP installation package. You can also download it separately from the WinSCP download page.

Using

PuTTYgen originates from PuTTY and is also part of the PuTTY installation package. It does not matter if you use PuTTYgen from WinSCP or the PuTTY installation package, they are identical.

To start PuTTYgen, go to Tools > PuTTYgen on Login dialog.

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When you run PuTTYgen you will see a window where you have two main choices: Generate, to generate a new public/private key pair, or Load to load in an existing private key.

This is a general outline of the procedure for generating a new key pair. The following sections describe the process in more detail.

  • First, you need to select which type of key you want to generate, and also select the strength of the key.
  • Then press the Generate button, to actually generate the key.
  • Once you have generated the key, select a comment field and a passphrase.
  • Now you’re ready to save the private key to disk; press the Save private key button.

Your key pair is now ready for use. You may also want to copy the public key to your server, either by copying it out of the Public key for pasting into OpenSSH authorized_keys file box, or by using the Save public key button. However, you don’t need to do this immediately; if you want, you can load the private key back into PuTTYgen later and the public key will be available for copying and pasting again.

For more details refer to guide to setting up public key authentication.

Before generating a key pair using PuTTYgen, you need to select which type of key you need.

The current version of the SSH protocol, SSH-2, supports several different key types. PuTTYgen can generate:

  • An RSA key for use with the SSH-2 protocol.
  • A DSA key for use with the SSH-2 protocol.
  • An ECDSA (elliptic curve DSA) key for use with the SSH-2 protocol.
  • An Ed25519 key (another elliptic curve algorithm) for use with the SSH-2 protocol.

PuTTYgen can also generate an RSA key suitable for use with the old SSH-1 protocol (which only supports RSA); for this, you need to select the SSH-1 (RSA) option. Since the SSH-1 protocol is no longer considered secure, it’s rare to need this option.

The Number of bits input box allows you to choose the strength of the key PuTTYgen will generate.

For RSA, 2048 bits should currently be sufficient for most purposes.

For ECDSA, only 256, 384, and 521 bits are supported. (ECDSA offers equivalent security to RSA with smaller key sizes.)

For Ed25519, the only valid size is 256 bits.

Once you have chosen the type of key you want, and the strength of the key, press the Generate button and PuTTYgen will begin the process of actually generating the key.

First, a progress bar will appear and PuTTYgen will ask you to move the mouse around to generate randomness. Wave the mouse in circles over the blank area in the PuTTYgen window, and the progress bar will gradually fill up as PuTTYgen collects enough randomness. You don’t need to wave the mouse in particularly imaginative patterns (although it can’t hurt); PuTTYgen will collect enough randomness just from the fine detail of exactly how far the mouse has moved each time Windows samples its position.

When the progress bar reaches the end, PuTTYgen will begin creating the key. The progress bar will reset to the start, and gradually move up again to track the progress of the key generation. It will not move evenly, and may occasionally slow down to a stop; this is unfortunately unavoidable, because key generation is a random process and it is impossible to reliably predict how long it will take.

When the key generation is complete, a new set of controls will appear in the window to indicate this.

The Key fingerprint box shows you a fingerprint value for the generated key. This is derived cryptographically from the public key value, so it doesn’t need to be kept secret; it is supposed to be more manageable for human beings than the public key itself.

The fingerprint value is intended to be cryptographically secure, in the sense that it is computationally infeasible for someone to invent a second key with the same fingerprint, or to find a key with a particular fingerprint.

If you have more than one key and use them for different purposes, you don’t need to memorize the key fingerprints in order to tell them apart. PuTTYgen allows you to enter a comment for your key, which will be displayed whenever WinSCP or Pageant asks you for the passphrase.

The default comment format, if you don’t specify one, contains the key type and the date of generation, such as rsa-key-20011212. Another commonly used approach is to use your name and the name of the computer the key will be used on, such as simon@simons-pc.

To alter the key comment, just type your comment text into the Key comment box before saving the private key. If you want to change the comment later, you can load the private key back into PuTTYgen, change the comment, and save it again.

The Key passphrase and Confirm passphrase boxes allow you to choose a passphrase for your key. The passphrase will be used to encrypt the key on disk, so you will not be able to use the key without first entering the passphrase.

When you save the key, PuTTYgen will check that the Key passphrase and Confirm passphrase boxes both contain exactly the same passphrase, and will refuse to save the key otherwise.

If you leave the passphrase fields blank, the key will be saved unencrypted. You should not do this without good reason; if you do, your private key file on disk will be all an attacker needs to gain access to any machine configured to accept that key. If you want to be able to passwordless log in without having to type a passphrase every time, you should consider using Pageant so that your decrypted key is only held in memory rather than on disk.

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Under special circumstances you may genuinely need to use a key with no passphrase; for example, if you need to run an automated batch script that needs to make an SSH connection, you can’t be there to type the passphrase. In this case we recommend you generate a special key for each specific batch script (or whatever) that needs one, and on the server side you should arrange that each key is restricted so that it can only be used for that specific purpose. The documentation for your SSH server should explain how to do this (it will probably vary between servers).

Choosing a good passphrase is difficult. Just as you shouldn’t use a dictionary word as a password because it’s easy for an attacker to run through a whole dictionary, you should not use a song lyric, quotation or other well-known sentence as a passphrase. If you want your passphrase to make grammatical sense, this cuts down the possibilities a lot and you should use a longer one as a result.

Do not forget your passphrase. There is no way to recover it.

Once you have generated a key, set a comment field and set a passphrase, you are ready to save your private key to disk.

Press the Save private key button. PuTTYgen will put up a dialog box asking you where to save the file. Select a directory, type in a file name, and press Save.

This file is in PuTTY’s native format (*.PPK); it is the one you will need to tell WinSCP to use for authentication.

If you have started PuTTYgen from SSH > Authentication page of Advanced Site Settings dialog, WinSCP automatically detects the saved key and will insert its path it into Private key file box.

RFC 4716 specifies a standard format for storing SSH-2 public keys on disk. Some SSH servers (such as ssh.com’s) require a public key in this format in order to accept authentication with the corresponding private key. (Others, such as OpenSSH, use a different format)

To save your public key in the SSH-2 standard format, press the Save public key button in PuTTYgen. PuTTYgen will put up a dialog box asking you where to save the file. Select a directory, type in a file name, and press Save.

You will then probably want to copy the public key file to your SSH server machine.

If you use this option with an SSH-1 key, the file PuTTYgen saves will contain exactly the same text that appears in the Public key for pasting box. This is the only existing standard for SSH-1 public keys.

The OpenSSH server, among others, requires your public key to be given to it in a one-line format before it will accept authentication with your private key. (SSH-1 servers also used this method.)

The Public key for pasting into OpenSSH authorized_keys file gives the public-key data in the correct one-line format.

For more details refer to guide to setting up public key authentication.

WinSCP can show you the public key too.

PuTTYgen allows you to load an existing private key file into memory. If you do this, you can then change the passphrase and comment before saving it again; you can also make extra copies of the public key.

To load an existing key, press the Load button. PuTTYgen will display a dialog box where you can browse around the file system and find your key file. Once you select the file, PuTTYgen will ask you for a passphrase (if necessary) and will then display the key details in the same way as if it had just generated the key.

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If you use the Load command to load a foreign key format, it will work, but you will see a message box warning you that the key you have loaded is not a PuTTY native key. See below for information about importing foreign key formats.

SSH-2 private keys have no standard format. OpenSSH and ssh.com have different formats, and WinSCP’s is different again. So a key generated with one client cannot immediately be used with another.

Using the Import command from the Conversions menu, PuTTYgen can load SSH-2 private keys in OpenSSH’s format and ssh.com’s format. Once you have loaded one of these key types, you can then save it back out as a PuTTY-format key (*.PPK) so that you can use it with the WinSCP. The passphrase will be unchanged by this process (unless you deliberately change it). You may want to change the key comment before you save the key, since some OpenSSH key formats contained no space for a comment, and ssh.com’s default comment format is long and verbose.

PuTTYgen can also export private keys in OpenSSH format and in ssh.com format. To do so, select one of the Export options from the Conversions menu. Exporting a key works exactly like saving it – you need to have typed your passphrase in beforehand, and you will be warned if you are about to save a key without a passphrase.

For OpenSSH there are two options. Modern OpenSSH actually has two formats it uses for storing private keys. Export OpenSSH key will automatically choose the oldest format supported for the key type, for maximum backward compatibility with older versions of OpenSSH; for newer key types like Ed25519, it will use the newer format as that is the only legal option. If you have some specific reason for wanting to use OpenSSH’s newer format even for RSA, DSA, or ECDSA keys, you can choose Export OpenSSH key (force new file format).

Most clients for the older SSH-1 protocol use a standard format for storing private keys on disk. PuTTY uses this format as well; so if you have generated an SSH-1 private key using OpenSSH or ssh.com’s client, you can use it with WinSCP, and vice versa. Hence, the export options are not available if you have generated an SSH-1 key.1

You can also use WinSCP /keygen command-line switch to convert the private key from other formats.

  1. The text is copy of PuTTY User Manual or was inspired by it.Back

Instances launched using Oracle Linux, CentOS, or Ubuntu images use an SSH key pair instead of a password to authenticate a remote user (see Security Credentials). A key pair consists of a private key and public key. You keep the private key on your computer and provide the public key every time you launch an instance.

When you connect to an instance using SSH, you provide the path to the key pair file in the SSH command. You can have as many key pairs as you want, or you can keep it simple and use one key pair for all or several of your instances.

To create key pairs, you can use a third-party tool such as OpenSSH on UNIX-style systems (including Linux, Solaris, BSD, and OS X) or PuTTY Key Generator on Windows.

Prerequisites

If you're using a UNIX-style system, you probably already have the ssh-keygen utility installed. To determine if it's installed, type ssh-keygen on the command line. If it's not installed, you can download OpenSSH for UNIX from http://www.openssh.com/portable.html and install it.

If you're using a Windows operating system you will need PuTTY and the PuTTY Key Generator. Download PuTTY and PuTTYgen from http://www.putty.org and install them.

Creating an SSH Key Pair on the Command Line

  1. Open a shell or terminal for entering the commands.
  2. At the prompt, enter ssh-keygen and provide a name and passphrase when prompted.

    The keys will be created with the default values: RSA keys of 2048 bits.

Alternatively, you can type a complete ssh-keygen command, for example:

The command arguments are shown in the following table:

ArgumentDescription
-t rsaUse the RSA algorithm.
-N '<passphrase>'

A passphrase to protect the use of the key (like a password). If you don't want to set a passphrase, don't enter anything between the quotes.

A passphrase is not required. You can specify one as a security measure to protect the private key from unauthorized use.

-b 2048

Generate a 2048-bit key. Generate ssh key windows 7. You don't have to set this if 2048 is acceptable, as 2048 is the default.

A minimum of 2048 bits is recommended for SSH-2 RSA.

-C '<key_name>'A name to identify the key.
-f <path/root_name>The location where the key pair will be saved and the root name for the files.

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Creating an SSH Key Pair Using PuTTY Key Generator

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  1. Find puttygen.exe in the PuTTY folder on your computer, for example, C:Program Files (x86)PuTTY. Double-click puttygen.exe to open it.
  2. Specify a key type of SSH-2 RSA and a key size of 2048 bits:

    • In the Key menu, confirm that the default value of SSH-2 RSA key is selected.
    • For the Type of key to generate, accept the default key type of RSA.
    • Set the Number of bits in a generated key to 2048 if it is not already set.
  3. Click Generate.
  4. Move your mouse around the blank area in the PuTTY window to generate random data in the key.

    When the key is generated, it appears under Public key for pasting into OpenSSH authorized_keys file.

  5. A Key comment is generated for you, including the date and time stamp. You can keep the default comment or replace it with your own more descriptive comment.
  6. Leave the Key passphrase field blank.
  7. Click Save private key, and then click Yes in the prompt about saving the key without a passphrase.

    The key pair is saved in the PuTTY Private Key (PPK) format, which is a proprietary format that works only with the PuTTY tool set.

    You can name the key anything you want, but use the ppk file extension. For example, mykey.ppk.

  8. Select all of the generated key that appears under Public key for pasting into OpenSSH authorized_keys file, copy it using Ctrl + C, paste it into a text file, and then save the file in the same location as the private key.

    (Do not use Save public key because it does not save the key in the OpenSSH format.)

    You can name the key anything you want, but for consistency, use the same name as the private key and a file extension of pub. For example, mykey.pub.

  9. Write down the names and location of your public and private key files. You will need the public key when launching an instance. You will need the private key to access the instance via SSH.

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Now that you have a key pair, you're ready to launch instances as described in Creating an Instance.