Setting Up a User's Public Key on the Server

Public key authentication is an alternative to password authentication, providing a more secure authentication method that allows users to avoid entering or storing a password, or sending it over the network. An Aspera client generates a key pair (a public key and a private key) on the client computer and provides the public key to the administrator of the remote Aspera transfer server. The server administrator sets up the client user's public key as described in the following steps.

1. Obtain the client user's public key.

   The client user should send you a secure email with the public key pasted in the message body or attached as a text file.

2. Install the public key in the user account on the server.
   1. Go to the user's folder, which in this example is C:\Users\aspera_user_1.
   2. Create a new folder named .ssh.
   3. If you received the key file as a text string, open a text editor and paste the key file text into a new file. Save the file with the name authorized_keys (with no file extension). If you received the key file as an attachment, save the file to C:\Users\aspera_user_1\.ssh with the name authorized_keys and no file extension.
      Note: Some text editors append a file extension automatically, such as .txt. Make sure to remove the file extension from the authorized_keys file.

      When done, the following file contains the user's key file:

      C:\Users\aspera_user_1\.ssh\authorized_keys

      User aspera_user_1 can now establish FASP connections with public key authentication.