I have been using Absolute Telnet (1.84) for months to connect to my server using SSH2. All of a sudden, it stopped working, and instead displays "disconnected: empty packet" when I try to connect. I can connect using plain old Telnet just fine. I complained to my hosting company, but they say they can connect just fine to my server using their SSH program (SecureCRT, I think they said). I'm behind a firewall both at home and at the office, but it's been working fine that way until now. Any thoughts on what causes this error?
[size=1][ July 26, 2002, 11:33 PM: Message edited by: Brian T. Pence ][/size]
Hello Toby, nice to hear from you again... Can you find out from your host if they changed anything recently or upgraded their ssh server??
Does the error message come immediately when you try to connect or just after you've been connected for awhile?
I specifically asked them if they'd changed any software, and they say they haven't.
The "empty packet" message happens immediately, before I'm even logged in.
Can you give me the IP address of the server?
Sure. It's 216.122.53.36.
I tried both the ssh1 and ssh2 modules, but I get stopped at the authentication level and never even reach the error you're getting. So, if there is something wrong in the client or server, it comes *after* the authentication stage.
Can you try switching ssh protocols and try turning off compression and altering the order of cipher preference?
All of this can be done via the Options->Properties->Connection dialogs.
If all else fails, you could make a temporary login for me to try myself. Contact me by e-mail if you're interested.
Toby,
any further word on this issue?
It took a while, but I finally got someone at the ISP who understood the problem and was willing to give me a straight answer. Here's what they said:
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Thank you for contacting Interland. Due to security vulnerabilities found in previous OpenSSH versions, we were forced to upgrade OpenSSH 3.4p1 on July 11th. In this upgrade, we enabled a feature called privilege separation. Though this feature makes OpenSSH more secure, it cannot be used with compression which was disabled. So, you should be able to connect to your VServer by disabling compression in your SSH client.
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I turned the compression in AbsoluteTelnet down to "None", but it still doesn't work. Any ideas?
After replicating this error with several windows ssh2 clients and my command line ssh2 from Linux, I *am* convinced that your sudden failures are related to the changes in your server's config.
It is true, as you state, that turning off compression in AbsoluteTelnet should fix the issue, but it does not for versions prior to 1.85 RC36. In all prior versions, it seems that turning the compression all the way down does *not* necessarily disable compression altogether. 1.85 RC36 addresses this, and it is available now at:
[url= http://www.celestialsoftware.net/telnet/beta_software.html ]http://www.celestialsoftware.net/telnet/beta_software.html[/url]
Thanks for your help in addressing this issue!!!
