portable ssh brian minton eku, dept. of technology, cen/cet)
TRANSCRIPT
Portable SSH
Brian MintonEKU, Dept. of Technology,
CEN/CET)
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The world is becoming more mobile and computers, it seems, are easily accessible these days.
Our information is scattered across multiple systems.
It is my goal to make it easy and safe to access information one might have on a home computer.
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MOTIVATIONForgetting an important
document at home is a
problem almost everyone
has encountered.
Why should one have to
go home and get it when
there is a link between
your home computer and
the computer at your
workplace?
MOTIVATION
Other points of motivation include:
Secure Web browsing from a public computer
Control over applications from any computer
on your home network when away from
home
Securely transfer files from any computer on
your home network to your flash drive
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INTRODUCTION A portable network connection to home could
be useful to a number of people in a number of ways:
Business Traveling business men who need access to network
files via a secure channel In meeting one can bring only a portable flash drive
instead of bringing their computer from their desk. Personal
If you are at a friends house and want to share music our videos that are on your hard drive at home
Some public networks restrict certain sites. A secure connection would allow for HTTP requests through your home’s Internet connection.
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PROBLEM STATEMENT
To provide a free and secure way to access one’s computer at home away from home.
To make this means of communication available from any PC.
To allow for fast file transfers between the two computers
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PROPOSED SOLUTION In order to access the computer at
home the home computer must have: A high speed Internet connection A secure sever side software that allows for
remote access over the Internet such as: VPN SSH PPoE
Proposed Solution The client would have to be portable
and secure. In order to accomplish this I debated between two alternatives Portable USB drive with the
appropriate client software and security features
Live OS CD with appropriate client software and security features.
Results
A 4GB Sandisk U3 flash drive will be used as the client.
It allows for password security when the drive is inserted
The software I needed could be installed onto the drive.
Software used for the client was
Portable Tunnelier Firefox VNC viewer
Results For the server side I used Windows XP Professional and
an SSH server. Additionally an Ubuntu machine is on the same
network. It can also be tunneled through the SSH server.
Applications are tunneled through the SSH server in order to provide secure communication for otherwise unsecure protocols.
Software used on the server side freeSSHd RealVNC SMB
RESULTS Tunnelier the
client uses two configuration files which are stored on the flash drive itself. One to connect to each computer on the home network.
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Results Port 5900 was
tunneled in both configuration files to the computer’s IP address. This allows for a Virtual Network Connection
Results An FTP client
would pop up once the connection was made. The initial directory will correspond to the computer that is being accessed.
Results By setting up this
network configuration in Firefox it will connect via proxy through the home network.
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CONCLUSIONS The ability to have a connection to the
workplace or home at all times could be extremely beneficial to almost anyone who has data on multiple devices.
There are commercial products out there that accomplish the same thing but cost monthly fees.
This could be beneficial to almost anyone because data is not always centralized
Conclusions Throughout this semester I have learned a
good deal about remote access. The world is becoming more mobile everyday
and working on this project helped me to realize the benefits of incorporating ideas of being portable into networking.
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FUTURE WORK There are many things that I
would like to do with this project: Ensuring that no trace is left on the
host computer Creating a Live OS to do the same
task Making it work through more
advanced network setups
