How to change SFTP default directory

Question

With proftpd you can change the default directory editing /etc/proftpd.conf
DefaultRoot ~
change to
DefaultRoot ~/music

How i can achieve the same result with SFTP?

Im using ubuntu lucid btw.

Ty so much for your help.

Answer 1

Have a look at this article which shows how to use sshd's ChrootDirectory to force all members of a particular group into a common directory root. You may be able to modify it to meet your requirements.

Answer 2

Perhaps there is a way to achieve what you want but as far as I know, sftp is operated over ssh so not so sure how to do that with ssh for every user.

However, one way to get around what you want to do is that you can update the user data to log in to certain directory as follows. This will w

$ sudo usermod -d [certain path that you want to direct] username

Answer 3

I just went through the same sort of thing with an Ubuntu Lucid 10.04 install. The answer seems to be to chroot certain logins to a specific folder. The only disadvantage being that the folder that they are chrooted to must be owned by root:root and can't be writable by the user logging in in order for ssh to allow the sftp login to work. SO, they only have access to other folders within the folder that they are chrooted to.

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1057657

Also, setting the default folder for the user using "usermod -d doesn't change the default for that user going to the root / folder upon sftp login.

Answer 4

If you're using ProFTPD, then take a look at the ProFTPD SFTP module.

Answer 5

lain's answer was helpful, but in the interest of being more explicit, and not depending on a link(and so I can find it next time):

Search the web for ChrootDirectory, to get the basic docs and setup, I'll not replicate them here, only point out how to solve the asked question.

For a dedicated file server use: Match Group *,!sudo so anybody who's not an admin get chrooted sftp only access - by default.

Set ChrootDirectory /home/%u -- chroot is based on username, not their home-directory

Make sure the users directory in /home is owned by root:root

Set the home-directory path in /etc/passwd to the directory you want to be logged into by default - but make it relative to the chroot directory:

If you want the user acnt to end up in /home/acnt/files/, then set the passwd home for acnt to /files

Make sure that /home/acnt/files is owned by acnt:acnt, so that the user can write to the directory, even though /home/acnt/ must be owned by root for the chroot jail to function.