Update: I have since published a forge module rnelson0-local_user that can be used to distribute keys as well. If you are using keys with local users, I highly recommend using the forge module. If you are not managing the users directly (say, for domain-joined nodes), continue to use the solution presented belwo.
Today, let’s look at deploying SSH Authorized Keys via puppet. An authorized key is a public key used for public key authentication (not to be confused with an ssh key, which is the unique key identifier of a host that verifies the server is who it says it is). By attaching an authorized key to a user, any login attempt for that user that presents the corresponding private key will be authenticated successfully, giving you the ability to log in without a password. This is commonly used for automation, where no user is present to enter a password, or for a user with a private key to access systems without additional steps.
Authorized keys are typically considered more secure than a password, but they rely on protecting the private key. If the private key is not secured, anyone who obtains the private key can impersonate the account. If a non-privileged user’s key is lost, only that user’s access and files are at immediate risk. An attacker would still need to escalate privileges to damage the system. If a privileged user’s key (no-one reading this logs in as a privileged user, such as root, right? RIGHT?) or an automation account’s key is lost, the immediate risk is much higher. An attacker might gain access to the entire system or be able to attack other systems. You must absolutely secure private keys and ensure you follow the principle of least privilege for all users, especially automation accounts.
Let’s look at an example of how to use a properly secured authorized key. In past articles, we’ve built a yum repository and a build server. You may be logging into these servers frequently and transfering files between the two. Every time, you need to enter your passwords. That gets old, quickly. If you had an authorized key in place, you can ssh to both servers and present your private key, no password. If you copy the private key to the build server or create a new key, you could scp files from the build server to the yumrepo the same way. This should make life a lot easier for you.
There are lots of ways to generate keys depending on your OS and applications. My workflow is to use Putty on a Windows 7 laptop to connect to linux VMs, then use the linux openssh client to ssh to other linux VMs. I’ll cover generating and configuring keys with Putty and openssh.
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