I tried added a key file and even a password txt but both lead to it still asking for me to type in the password.

Is it because the drive is encrypted? I tried placing the files at /, /boot, /root, /etc

Edit1: I’ve tried to install dropbear and give it ssh keys. I will try to reboot in the morning and see what happens

Edit2: signing in via ssh just says port 22 rejected not working :(

  • kevincox
    8·
    8 hours ago
    1. Wiping the drive is a lot easier, just overwrite the root key a few times.
    2. If you store the key on a different drive you can safely dispose of the drive just by separating the two. (I do on my home server, keeping the decryption key on a USB drive. If I need to ship the server or discard old hardware I can just hold onto the thumb drive and not worry about the data being read.)

    Security is always about tradeoffs. On my home server unattended reboots are necessary so it needs to auto-decrypt. But using encryption means I don’t need to worry about discarding broken hardware or if I need to travel with the server were it may be inspected. For my laptop, desktop and phone where I don’t need unattended reboots I require the encryption key on bootup.

    • Unmapped
      2·
      2 hours ago

      Thanks, both of your points are good. I was thinking about it in terms of what OP is trying to do. Having key on the same drive. Putting the key on a separate drive or even the cloud like someone else suggested makes sense. I have all of my computers on manual. Since I don’t have anything critical enough that it can’t wait till I’m back home to start it back up.

      • kevincox
        1·
        1 hour ago

        Yeah, I don’t think there are many benefits when keeping the key on the same drive. Other than a bit of obfuscation. It does still help with erasing, as you can wipe the keyslots (rendering the key useless) but with modern storage media deletion is fairly hard to ensure. But still better than unencrypted.