Is it safe to open ssh port to world with only key based authentication?

[Ian Pilcher]

Vijay Gill wrote:
     I read it somewhere (I googled and found it, but cannot find it
> again) that if password based authentication is disabled and using
> only key based, it is safe to have your fedora box available over the
> internet so that you can login remotely.

I opened port 22 at one point (with password-based authentication on),
and it didn't take long before someone in Asia was trying to guess IDs
and passwords.

My current setup uses OpenVPN (available in Fedora Extras) running on a
randomly selected UDP port.  UDP port scans are much slower than TCP
port scans, so it's less likely to be noticed.

-- 
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Ian Pilcher                                        i.pilcher at comcast.net
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