Openssh And Netdrive ...

[bob selby]

I have found a Windows tool called NetDrive (seemingly free for personal use) that allows you to map an SFTP server as a local drive. Works well in general.

However, one SFTP server I use is OpenSSH on my freesco box and for security reasons it has passwords disabled and uses certificate based authentication only.

WinSCP and Putty deal with this case very well but I cannot figure out how to get NetDrive to do it - password authentication works fine - but I cannot figure out where to install the certificate.

I would prefer to use NetDrive in this way - the NetDrive forum has yielded no help, neither has an email to the developer. Any help welcome.

If "push comes to shove" there is one alternative ... use putty to tunnel into the freesco network and use password authentication to connect to Openssh on the secure side .... Can anyone say if it is possible to setup Openssh so that it uses certificate based authentication on the outward facing port and password based on the inward facing port??? I could live with using two different ports.

I could use FTP instead of SFTP on the inward facing network I guess - but trying to resist it.

TIA
Bob

[Lightning]

From what I can see there are ONLY two connection types possible. One is standard FTP and the other is Webdav. So your best option to make this connection have any encryption possibilities is to use a PuTTy tunnel and connect to the internal FTP interface from the outside. The functionality of this program is really neat for internal use, but it lacks any security for Internet use unless you use an open FTP server with passwords. Which would not be my first, second, or even third choices.

However one other choice that would work well with this type of application would be to install the "knock" package. What that does is to allow you to run the FTP server in secure mode and then from the Windows machine you run the knock client and the firewall opens the FTP ports 20 and 21 only to the IP address the correct knock sequence came from. Of course this option works well and makes the FTP server secure from anyone trying to hack passwords and such. But it lacks any encryption capabilities for the data being transferred.

[bob selby]

NetDrive has the option of using SSH if the basic mode is FTP - under "advanced"->"SSL"->"SFTP using SSH2" and it works for passwords. Of course you need to specify port 22 rather than 21.

Bob

[dingetje]

Nice, works like a charm with username/password authentication, but it indeed lacks the feature to use certificate based authentication. The lack of response on the support forum is not a good sign...

[bob selby]

Looking at the logs it produces I suspect that it can use certificates ... the problem is putting them where it can find them

[dingetje]

Indeed the logs show an attempt to locate id_dsa and id_dsa.pub key files, but no clue as where these files are expected to be?

In the *nix world these files reside in .ssh directory in the $HOME directory which would translate to \Documents and Settings\<username>\.ssh in the Windoze world.

However, I've tried placing the key files there and NetDrive still fails to find them (according to the log). Using tools like FileMon (or ProcMon) NetDrive doesn't show any attempts to access id_dsa or id_dsa.pub files as suggested in the logs???

I think support by the author(s) is needed...

[bob selby]

Thanks ... that was the conclusion I came to ... I wont hold my breath for a reply from the author - there is a distinct lack of respone on the support forums