SSH: Switch from public key authentication to password

Question

I have an account i SSH into. How do i switch to using a plain old password to login rather than my public/private key pair?

Answer 1

The PasswordAuthentication option in the /etc/ssh/sshd_config file controls whether passwords are allowed.

Really, though. Use public keys.

Answer 2

If you want to do this temporarily, you could connect to the server with ssh -o 'PubkeyAuthentication no' server. If you want to do this permanently, on the server you could remove your public key from ~/.ssh/authorized_keys or on your computer you could add the following to ~/.ssh/config

Hostname server
PubkeyAuthentication no

Answer 3

if you know the password it should be a matter of supplying the password... if you dont know it and have access to the system, simply reset it by running

passwd

to force it to use password login, you will have to remove your private key file from its currently location (linux/mac) or disable it in your ssh client

you also need to check that password auth is enabled in your ssh config

however i also echo the other comments, switching from key auth to password is NOT recommended as you are effectively lowering your level of security, i would be asking why you are making this kind of switch