What steps can I take to make sshd more secure?
OpenSSH has many settings that can be adjusted in order to increase security. You may wish to refer to OpenSSH security websites or to the many books on the subject. However, here are some things that you may wish to consider based on my experience: • Disable logins to root. This can be accomplished by setting the PermitRootLogin setting in the sshd_config file (typically, /etc/ssh/sshd_config). PermitRootLogin no • Disable password logins entirely by editing the PasswordAuthentication setting. By doing so, each user with access to the server will need to create ssh keys (which is beyond the scope of this document). PasswordAuthentication no • Run sshd on a different port. By default, sshd runs on port 22. Most sshd hackers will only attack port 22 so if you run sshd on a different port, the chances of being compromised are reduced dramatically. However, by running sshd on an alternate port requires each user to be aware of this (so if your server is accessed by many user accounts then
