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Can't login into new instance Permission Denied (publickey)

Posted on November 4, 2016

Rebuilt an image and now I can’t login into my instance!

my /etc/hosts file has my ip address under howlit

Here is my output from: ssh -vv root@howlit

debug1: Host 'howlit' is known and matches the ECDSA host key.
debug1: Found key in /Users/kyle.calica-steinhil/.ssh/known_hosts:40
Warning: Permanently added the ECDSA host key for IP address 'XXX.XX.XX.XXX' to the list of known hosts.
debug2: set_newkeys: mode 1
debug1: SSH2_MSG_NEWKEYS sent
debug1: expecting SSH2_MSG_NEWKEYS
debug2: set_newkeys: mode 0
debug1: SSH2_MSG_NEWKEYS received
debug1: Roaming not allowed by server
debug1: SSH2_MSG_SERVICE_REQUEST sent
debug2: service_accept: ssh-userauth
debug1: SSH2_MSG_SERVICE_ACCEPT received
debug2: key: /Users/kyle.calica-steinhil/.ssh/id_rsa (0x7fe5a8500950),
debug2: key: /Users/kyle.calica-steinhil/.ssh/id_dsa (0x0),
debug2: key: /Users/kyle.calica-steinhil/.ssh/id_ecdsa (0x0),
debug2: key: /Users/kyle.calica-steinhil/.ssh/id_ed25519 (0x0),
debug1: Authentications that can continue: publickey
debug1: Next authentication method: publickey
debug1: Offering RSA public key: /Users/kyle.calica-steinhil/.ssh/id_rsa
debug2: we sent a publickey packet, wait for reply
debug1: Authentications that can continue: publickey
debug1: Trying private key: /Users/kyle.calica-steinhil/.ssh/id_dsa
debug1: Trying private key: /Users/kyle.calica-steinhil/.ssh/id_ecdsa
debug1: Trying private key: /Users/kyle.calica-steinhil/.ssh/id_ed25519
debug2: we did not send a packet, disable method
debug1: No more authentication methods to try.
Permission denied (publickey).

Changed anything with my IP address to ‘XXX.XX.XX.XXX



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In my case there was a problem with directory permissions. Check this out

/home

drwxr-xr-x.   9 root root   113 Jun 28 22:57 home

and then your home directory:

drwxr-----   5  user group   124 May 18 17:00 user
drwx------  2  user group   29 May 18 12:05 .ssh
-rw-------  1 user group 2235 Jun 28 23:09 authorized_keys

Troubleshooting

  • start sshd in debug mode
service sshd stop

run sshd debug mode:

/usr/sbin/sshd -ddd

my error messages

...
          debug1: trying public key file /home/USER/.ssh/authorized_keys
          debug1: Could not open authorized keys '/home/USER/.ssh/authorized_keys': Permission denied
...

<^>You can take look at SSH keys tutorial for steps. You will need to copy it manually as ssh-copy-id is not available via Console. You can temporary enable password authentication. Open SSH config:

sudo nano /etc/ssh/sshd_config

Find out PasswordAuthentication to yes:

PasswordAuthentication yes

Save file and exit editor. It requires you to restart SSH service:

sudo systemctl restart sshd

<^> This works! Thanks

I had the same problem, and after 4-5 hours I realize the problem and found the solution.

I’m not sure about the reason, but the server only allows keys with 1024 bytes. You can:

  1. create a 1024 key locally: ssh-keygen -t rsa -b 1024 -N "" -f ~/.ssh/id_rsa_docean
  2. add it to the keys in your profile
  3. use it to create the droplet
  4. use it to login: ssh root@YOUR_IP -i id_rsa_docean

Because of another bug, maybe using more than 1 key may fail because the authorized_keys may corrupt.

I’d love to know why those two problems: the authorized_keys mess and the size limit in the key.

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