Question

I have spent almost 24hours trying to figure out what I’m doing wrong, but I can’t figure this out. Starting to feel there is something wrong with my local setup.

• I’ve made sure to chmod 400 erik-keypair.pem
• I’ve stored erik-keypair.pem in my user .ssh folder, AND relocated the other id_rsa files just so they don’t interfere (trying to remove any variables)
• Ec2 instance security has ssh enabled

Here’s the response

$ ssh -v -v -i erik-keypair.pem [e-mail]
OpenSSH_5.2p1, OpenSSL 0.9.8l 5 Nov 2009
debug1: Reading configuration data /etc/ssh_config
debug2: ssh_connect: needpriv 0
debug1: Connecting to ec2-XX-XX-XX-XXX.compute-1.amazonaws.com [XX.XX.XX.XXX] port 22.
debug1: Connection established.
debug2: key_type_from_name: unknown key type '-----BEGIN'
debug2: key_type_from_name: unknown key type '-----END'
debug1: identity file erik-keypair.pem type -1
debug1: Remote protocol version 2.0, remote software version OpenSSH_5.1p1 Debian-5ubuntu1
debug1: match: OpenSSH_5.1p1 Debian-5ubuntu1 pat OpenSSH*
debug1: Enabling compatibility mode for protocol 2.0
debug1: Local version string SSH-2.0-OpenSSH_5.2
debug2: fd 3 setting O_NONBLOCK
debug1: SSH2_MSG_KEXINIT sent
debug1: SSH2_MSG_KEXINIT received
debug2: kex_parse_kexinit: diffie-hellman-group-exchange-sha256,diffie-hellman-group-exchange-sha1,diffie-hellman-group14-sha1,diffie-hellman-group1-sha1
debug2: kex_parse_kexinit: ssh-rsa,ssh-dss
debug2: kex_parse_kexinit: aes128-ctr,aes192-ctr,aes256-ctr,arcfour256,arcfour128,aes128-cbc,3des-cbc,blowfish-cbc,cast128-cbc,aes192-cbc,aes256-cbc,arcfour,[e-mail]
debug2: kex_parse_kexinit: aes128-ctr,aes192-ctr,aes256-ctr,arcfour256,arcfour128,aes128-cbc,3des-cbc,blowfish-cbc,cast128-cbc,aes192-cbc,aes256-cbc,arcfour,[e-mail]
debug2: kex_parse_kexinit: hmac-md5,hmac-sha1,[e-mail],hmac-ripemd160,[e-mail],hmac-sha1-96,hmac-md5-96
debug2: kex_parse_kexinit: hmac-md5,hmac-sha1,[e-mail],hmac-ripemd160,[e-mail],hmac-sha1-96,hmac-md5-96
debug2: kex_parse_kexinit: none,[e-mail],zlib
debug2: kex_parse_kexinit: none,[e-mail],zlib
debug2: kex_parse_kexinit: 
debug2: kex_parse_kexinit: 
debug2: kex_parse_kexinit: first_kex_follows 0 
debug2: kex_parse_kexinit: reserved 0 
debug2: kex_parse_kexinit: diffie-hellman-group-exchange-sha256,diffie-hellman-group-exchange-sha1,diffie-hellman-group14-sha1,diffie-hellman-group1-sha1
debug2: kex_parse_kexinit: ssh-rsa,ssh-dss
debug2: kex_parse_kexinit: aes128-cbc,3des-cbc,blowfish-cbc,cast128-cbc,arcfour128,arcfour256,arcfour,aes192-cbc,aes256-cbc,[e-mail],aes128-ctr,aes192-ctr,aes256-ctr
debug2: kex_parse_kexinit: aes128-cbc,3des-cbc,blowfish-cbc,cast128-cbc,arcfour128,arcfour256,arcfour,aes192-cbc,aes256-cbc,[e-mail],aes128-ctr,aes192-ctr,aes256-ctr
debug2: kex_parse_kexinit: hmac-md5,hmac-sha1,[e-mail],hmac-ripemd160,[e-mail],hmac-sha1-96,hmac-md5-96
debug2: kex_parse_kexinit: hmac-md5,hmac-sha1,[e-mail],hmac-ripemd160,[e-mail],hmac-sha1-96,hmac-md5-96
debug2: kex_parse_kexinit: none,[e-mail]
debug2: kex_parse_kexinit: none,[e-mail]
debug2: kex_parse_kexinit: 
debug2: kex_parse_kexinit: 
debug2: kex_parse_kexinit: first_kex_follows 0 
debug2: kex_parse_kexinit: reserved 0 
debug2: mac_setup: found hmac-md5
debug1: kex: server->client aes128-ctr hmac-md5 none
debug2: mac_setup: found hmac-md5
debug1: kex: client->server aes128-ctr hmac-md5 none
debug1: SSH2_MSG_KEX_DH_GEX_REQUEST(1024<1024<8192) sent
debug1: expecting SSH2_MSG_KEX_DH_GEX_GROUP
debug2: dh_gen_key: priv key bits set: 124/256
debug2: bits set: 502/1024
debug1: SSH2_MSG_KEX_DH_GEX_INIT sent
debug1: expecting SSH2_MSG_KEX_DH_GEX_REPLY
debug1: Host 'ec2-XX-XX-XX-XXX.compute-1.amazonaws.com' is known and matches the RSA host key.
debug1: Found key in /Users/erik/.ssh/known_hosts:1
debug2: bits set: 523/1024
debug1: ssh_rsa_verify: signature correct
debug2: kex_derive_keys
debug2: set_newkeys: mode 1
debug1: SSH2_MSG_NEWKEYS sent
debug1: expecting SSH2_MSG_NEWKEYS
debug2: set_newkeys: mode 0
debug1: SSH2_MSG_NEWKEYS received
debug1: SSH2_MSG_SERVICE_REQUEST sent
debug2: service_accept: ssh-userauth
debug1: SSH2_MSG_SERVICE_ACCEPT received
debug2: key: erik-keypair.pem (0x0)
debug1: Authentications that can continue: publickey
debug1: Next authentication method: publickey
debug1: Trying private key: erik-keypair.pem
debug1: read PEM private key done: type RSA
debug2: we sent a publickey packet, wait for reply
debug1: Authentications that can continue: publickey
debug2: we did not send a packet, disable method
debug1: No more authentication methods to try.
Permission denied (publickey).

Does anyone spot what I’m doing wrong?

Answer 1

Rodney Quillo’s answer is very likely correct. I would expand it by saying that the official Ubuntu distributions also have the default user as ubuntu.