Hello, I was working to add a new user on our droplet, and I accidentally disabled the root user ssh key login. Is there a way to revert back to password login for the root user? If I set PasswordAuthentication to yes in sshd_config and restart ssh, it still asks for the password for the SSH key when I login with root.
This textbox defaults to using Markdown to format your answer.
You can type !ref in this text area to quickly search our full set of tutorials, documentation & marketplace offerings and insert the link!
Hello, @avebury
In order to enable the password level authentication, you need to set the PasswordAuthentication to yes in /etc/ssh/sshd_config
Once this is done you can restart the ssh service and give it another try. You can also check the value of PubkeyAuthentication in the sshd_config as well.
If you’re still getting the prompt the passphrase for your ssh-key you can make sure that you connect to the droplet without specifying the use of an ssh-key in your ssh client.
Also, the droplet default setting is the PasswordAuthentication in case you do not have any ssh-keys configured.
If you want to authenticate using an ssh-key you can disable the PasswordAuthentication by setting it to no and make sure that your ssh-key is also present in the ~/.ssh/authorized_keys file.
Regards, Alex
Get paid to write technical tutorials and select a tech-focused charity to receive a matching donation.
Full documentation for every DigitalOcean product.
The Wave has everything you need to know about building a business, from raising funding to marketing your product.
Stay up to date by signing up for DigitalOcean’s Infrastructure as a Newsletter.
New accounts only. By submitting your email you agree to our Privacy Policy
Scale up as you grow — whether you're running one virtual machine or ten thousand.
Sign up and get $200 in credit for your first 60 days with DigitalOcean.*
*This promotional offer applies to new accounts only.