Linux Generate Pre Shared Key
Generate a static key: openvpn -genkey -secret static.key. Copy the static key to both client and server, over a pre-existing secure channel. Server configuration file dev tun ifconfig 10.8.0.1 10.8.0.2 secret static.key Client configuration file remote myremote.mydomain dev tun ifconfig 10.8.0.2 10.8.0.1 secret static.key Firewall configuration.
A Pre-Shared Key (PSK) or also known as a shared secret is a string of characters that is used as an authentication key in cryptographic processes. A PSK is shared before being used and is held by both parties to the communication to authenticate each other, usually before other authentication methods such as usernames and passwords are applied.
Multiple Way To Generate a Strong Pre-Shared Key (PSK) in Linux 1. Using GPG Command. GPG is a command-line tool that is used to provide digital encryption and signing services. Apr 03, 2020 A pre-shared key (also called a shared secret or PSK) is used to authenticate the Cloud VPN tunnel to your peer VPN gateway. As a security best practice, it's recommended that you generate a strong 32-character shared secret. If you just want to generate pre-shared keys and not use certificates, then two examples are provided at Linux Kernel 2.6 using KAME-tools using xxd - 'make a hexdump or do the reverse'. Authenticationmethod presharedkey. Defines the authentication method used during node negotiation. Red Hat Enterprise Linux by default uses pre-shared keys for authentication. Specifies the Diffie-Hellman group number for establishing dynamically-generated session keys. By default, the 1024-bit group is used.
It is commonly used in different types of Virtual Private Network (VPN) connections, wireless networks in a type of encryption known as WPA-PSK (Wi-Fi Protected Access Pre-Shared Key) and WPA2-PSK, and also in the EAP (Extensible Authentication Protocol Pre-Shared Key), and many others authentication mechanisms.
In this article, we will show you different ways to generate a strong Pre-Shared Key in Linux distributions.
1. Using OpenSSL Command
OpenSSL is a well-known and widely-used command-line tool used to invoke the various cryptography functions of OpenSSL’s crypto library from the shell. To generate a strong PSK use its rand sub-command which generates pseudo-random bytes and filter it through base64 encodings as shown.
2. Using GPG Command
GPG is a command-line tool to provide digital encryption and signing services using the OpenPGP standard. You can use its --gen-random option to generate a strong PSK and filter it through base64 encoding as shown.
In the following commands, 1 or 2 is the quality level and 10, 20, 40, and 70 are the character counts.
Generate PSK Key Using GPG Command
Linux Generate Pre Shared Key Vizio
3. Using Pseudorandom Number Generators
You can also use any of the pseudorandom number generators in Linux such as /dev/random or /dev/urandom, as follows. The -c option of the head command helps to generate the number of characters.
4. Using date and sha245sum Commands
Linux Generate Pre Shared Key Found
The date and sha256sum command can be combined to create a strong PSK as follows.
Generate PSK Using date Command
Generate Pre-shared Key
The above are some of the many ways of generating strong Pre-Shared Key in Linux. Do you know of any other methods? If yes, share it with us via the feedback form below.