[SOLVED] ssh from linux to windows works works only via password, not keys

Issue

in my target scenario I need to connect remotely from linux to windows and execute powershell commands. For this, I have installed the native open ssh server on windows and pwoershell core 6 on both machines.

Remoting works just fine if I use password authentication on sshd. It does not work when requiring key-based authentication.

PS /> Enter-PSSession -HostName computername -UserName 'domain\username' -KeyFilePath ./sshkeys/win/win10 -Verbose
Enter passphrase for key '/sshkeys/win/win10':
Enter-PSSession : The background process reported an error with the following message: The SSH client session has ended with error message: Connection to computername closed by remote host..
At line:1 char:1
+ Enter-PSSession -HostName computername -UserName 'domain\username' -KeyFilePath ...
+ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
+ CategoryInfo          : ResourceUnavailable: (:) [Enter-PSSession], PSRemotingTransportException

Does someone know what might be causing the error here?

Solution

For anyone interested, I resolved this issue by further researching.

The command/setup is perfectly fine, but there was an outstanding issue with the open ssh server's version included with the bundle I installed with "Add-WindowsCapability" cmdlet.

This bundle installed version 7.6p1-beta on my Win10 machine. But as a matter of fact this issue has been fixed as of 7.6.1p1-beta, see: https://github.com/PowerShell/Win32-OpenSSH/issues/1098

Manually downloading and running the latest version of the SSH Server fixed it for me.

Answered By - baouss