1PAM_SSH(8)                BSD System Manager's Manual               PAM_SSH(8)
2

NAME

4     pam_ssh — authentication and session management with SSH private keys
5

SYNOPSIS

7     [service-name] module-type control-flag pam_ssh [options]
8

DESCRIPTION

10     The SSH authentication service module for PAM, pam_ssh provides function‐
11     ality for two PAM categories: authentication and session management.  In
12     terms of the module-type parameter, they are the “auth” and “session”
13     features.  It also provides null functions for the remaining categories.
14
15   SSH Authentication Module
16     The SSH authentication component provides a function to verify the iden‐
17     tity of a user (pam_sm_authenticate()), by prompting the user for a
18     passphrase and verifying that it can decrypt the target user's SSH key
19     using that passphrase.
20
21     The following options may be passed to the authentication module:
22
23     debug           syslog(3) debugging information at LOG_DEBUG level.
24
25     use_first_pass  If the authentication module is not the first in the
26                     stack, and a previous module obtained the user's pass‐
27                     word, that password is used to authenticate the user.  If
28                     this fails, the authentication module returns failure
29                     without prompting the user for a password.  This option
30                     has no effect if the authentication module is the first
31                     in the stack, or if no previous modules obtained the
32                     user's password.
33
34     try_first_pass  This option is similar to the use_first_pass option,
35                     except that if the previously obtained password fails,
36                     the user is prompted for another password.
37
38     keyfiles        Specify the comma-separated list of files in $HOME/.ssh
39                     to check for SSH keys.  The default is
40                     “id_dsa,id_rsa,identity”.
41
42     nullok          Allow empty passphrases.
43
44   SSH Session Management Module
45     The SSH session management component provides functions to initiate
46     (pam_sm_open_session()) and terminate (pam_sm_close_session()) sessions.
47     The pam_sm_open_session() function starts an SSH agent, passing it any
48     private keys it decrypted during the authentication phase, and sets the
49     environment variables the agent specifies.  The pam_sm_close_session()
50     function kills the previously started SSH agent by sending it a SIGTERM.
51
52     The following options may be passed to the session management module:
53
54     debug           syslog(3) debugging information at LOG_DEBUG level.
55

FILES

57     $HOME/.ssh/identity   SSH1/OpenSSH RSA key
58     $HOME/.ssh/id_dsa     OpenSSH DSA key
59     $HOME/.ssh2/id_rsa_*  SSH2 RSA keys
60     $HOME/.ssh2/id_dsa_*  SSH2 DSA keys
61     /var/run/pam_ssh/<user>*
62                           ssh-agent environment information. The files are
63                           owned by the superuser but readable by the users.
64                           The location is Fedora specific, in the original
65                           package these files are in $HOME/.ssh/agent-*
66

SEE ALSO

68     ssh-agent(1), syslog(3), pam.conf(5), pam(8)
69

AUTHORS

71     Andrew J. Korty <ajk@iu.edu> wrote pam_ssh.  Dag-Erling Smorgrav wrote
72     the original OpenPAM support code.  Mark R V Murray wrote the original
73     version of this manual page.
74
75BSD                            November 26, 2001                           BSD
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