Friday, April 15, 2022

[SOLVED] Allow SSH from PowerShell without Administrator privileges

Issue

I mean to get a terminal in an Ubuntu 20.04LTS server via ssh under PS 5.1 in Win 10. I know I can work with href="https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/administration/openssh/openssh_install_firstuse" rel="nofollow noreferrer">native support for OpenSSH, and I have already done it before.

Now I want to do it without having admin rights, to minimize "tainting" my system. For reasons described below (1), I think I cannot work with native OpenSSH.

For reasons described below (2), I think it is possible. For instance, I can already start a session and issue remote commands ref, see below (3). But I couldn't start a terminal.

Is there a way to accomplish what I mean? How?

(1) Why, for my purposes, I cannot work with native OpenSSH?

For instance, the first two commands in the PS-way of enabling OpenSSH already require admin (my PS is in Spanish):

> Get-WindowsCapability -Online | ? Name -like 'OpenSSH*'
Get-WindowsCapability : La operación solicitada requiere elevación.
> Add-WindowsCapability -Online -Name OpenSSH.Client~~~~0.0.1.0
Add-WindowsCapability : La operación solicitada requiere elevación.

(2) Why I think it might be possible to get an ssh terminal without admin rights in PS?

  1. Because I can already perform several similarly demanding actions as a regular user without admin rights, outside PS:

    1.1. I can ssh from Msys2 portable

    1.2. I can connect from putty (portable)

    1.3. I can transfer via WinSCP portable

  2. Item (3) below.

(3) How to start an ssh session and issue remote commands from PS

Install Posh-SSH for the current user only. Then

> New-SSHSession -Host xxx.xxx.0.xxx -Credential (Get-Credential)

cmdlet Get-Credential at command pipeline position 1
Supply values for the following parameters:
Credential

Server SSH Fingerprint
Do you want to trust the fingerprint xx:xx:...
[] Y  [] N  [?] Ayuda (el valor predeterminado es "N"): y
SessionId  Host                                                                               Connected
---------  ----                                                                               ---------
    0      xxx.xxx.0.xxx                                                                        True
> Get-SSHSession
SessionId  Host                                                                               Connected
---------  ----                                                                               ---------
    0      xxx.xxx.0.xxx                                                                        True
> Invoke-SSHCommand -Index 0 -Command "pwd"
Host       : xxx.xxx.0.xxx
Output     : {/home/user1}
ExitStatus : 0

Solution

Windows 10 has SSH built in since v1809. An OpenSSH-Client is already installed, you can directly use it by calling ssh. Try Get-Command ssh. It should return C:\WINDOWS\System32\OpenSSH\ssh.exe. You can connect to anything that supports SSH without administrative privileges "out of the box":

ssh -l <username> <DNS-Name/IP>

There is also an OpenSSH-Server available, but has to be enabled as a feature first. You probably need administrative privileges to enable that.

MS documentation on enabling OpenSSH-Server



Answered By - stackprotector
Answer Checked By - Timothy Miller (WPSolving Admin)
at