#How to ssh on mac how to#

A private key with a weak or no passphrase is a gift to hackers! Generally speaking, a good 16 character passphrase will keep the world's most powerful computers at bay until the sun burns out! In the above example, two files will be created in the hidden.

Note: If your private key ever gets stolen, this password is your last line of defence. Keep this passphrase somewhere secure so you can get to it later (you'll need it anytime you want to use your private key from a new computer). Enter a STRONG passphrase including upper and lowercase letters, numbers, and symbols. When you hit enter you will be asked to provide a Passphrase. Replace john with a single word (no spaces) that will help you identify the files that the command will generate.

Enter the following command carefully: ssh-keygen -t rsa -b 2048 -C 'John Smith' -f johnJust replace John Smith with your own name (keeping the quotation marks, they're important!). ssh pwdThis should then echo this back to you: /Users//.sshNow we need to generate your keypair. Once Terminal is open, we need to change change directory to the hidden.

Create the keys Open the Terminal application from the Applications/Utilities folder, or press - and search for Terminal using Spotlight.

You can open them in TextEdit.app if you are curious! The key files are just plain text - nothing magical. Because only you have the private key you can always regenerate the public key again from it. It doesn't matter if your public key gets stolen or lost. The public key can be freely installed on remote systems. The private key remains on your computer and should be kept safe from unauthorised access. Public/private key authentication, as the name suggests, uses two special cryptographic files (called keys) to authenticate your login. MacOS is derived from Unix style operating systems, so understandably, the tools to manage SSH connections are already built in.

#How to ssh on mac how to#

How to use public/private keys for SSH and SFTP (MacOS)