Introduction to PaSSHport

What is PaSSHport ?

PaSSHport is a software that allows you to control the SSH access of your IT components : Linux/Unix servers, network switchs, routers, WiFi access points, and any appliances that is accessed by SSH. In three words : who accesses what ?

PaSSHport has been written with the following in mind :

  • Similar to SSHgate

  • Two main objects : targets and users (we'll see below what are those)

  • Objects can be grouped : targetgroups and usergroups

  • Record all sessions of users

  • Can be fully configure and used from the command line interface

  • Can do Secured Copy (scp)

  • REST API based communication between components so that it can be easily integrated in an automated IT environment

  • Use only OpenSource technologies

Please read below to understand the main components, and how they work together.

Components

PaSSHport project is composed with 3 main programs :

  • passhportd : the daemon that verify access rights, and store configuration

  • passhport : the script that receive the connection (it does NOT replace the SSH server). Think of it has the shell a user falls into when connecting to a PaSSHport gateway

  • passhport-admin : the script that is used to configure passhportd. SysAdmins will use it to add a user, a target, a usergroup, a targetgroup, and combine those to configure accesses

_images/Composants_PaSSHport_EN.png

Now let's go to the installation process…