Telnet is inherently insecure. Credential information (Single Sign-on (SSO) user IDs and passwords) submitted through telnet is not encrypted and is therefore vulnerable to identity theft. However, users can establish an SSH connection instead to prevent this type of intrusion.

A Secure Shell (SSH) connection is used to log onto a remote machine over a network, to execute commands on a remote machine, and to transfer files from one machine to another. SSH replaces telnet, rlogin, rsh, and rcp.

Windows

IT officially supports the PuTTY client as the tool of choice for Windows machines for creating a secure remote connection to the university network. PuTTY can be used to establish a connection to UNIX machines on campus as well as the numerically intensive computing machine (NIC). PuTTY is also used for creating an X-windows session (graphical UNIX interface).

Mac OS X

Mac OS X already has built-in support for SSH. To initiate an SSH connection with the university network through Mac OS X, follow these steps:

Linux

Linux also has built-in support for SSH. To initiate an SSH connection with the university network through Linux, simply open a terminal session, type ssh <hostname>, and then authenticate using your SSO User ID and password.

Additional Information

• Unix Server Hostname -- Remotely connect to UNIX computers on the ECE, CS, and NIC servers via PuTTY, WinSCP, etc.