How do I disable SSHD from starting automatically?

Question

After installing openssh-server, the server start every time I boot. If I want it to be manual what do I need to do?

In version 0.6.7+ of upstart I would add a "manual" stanza to the job file.

10.04 has upstart 0.6.5-8. What is the preferred way to disable ssh from starting automatically in this case?

score 34 · Answer 1 · edited Aug 12 '11 at 16:19

34

Rename /etc/init/ssh.conf to /etc/init/ssh.conf.disabled.

sudo mv /etc/init/ssh.conf /etc/init/ssh.conf.disabled

edited Aug 12 '11 at 16:19

Jorge Castro

71,754

answered Aug 12 '11 at 16:11

komputes

3,233

1

Fast, easy and self-documenting. Perfect. – LeartS Jan 28 '14 at 15:47
2

Possibly even better than echo manual | sudo tee /etc/init/ssh.conf.override , see also how-to-enable-or-disable-services – here Jan 02 '15 at 09:48
echo manual | sudo tee /etc/init/ssh.conf.override seems like a much better answer, because sudo mv /etc/init/ssh.conf /etc/init/ssh.conf.disabled also prevents starting the server manually without changing it back every time. – Brian Z Jun 07 '15 at 04:19
@BrianZ ssh.conf.override does not work for me, ssh.override instead. – fikr4n Feb 28 '16 at 01:22
1

This is not the recommended way. You're not telling the OS that the service is not supposed to run. Use update-rc.d (or equivalent) to do that. – Reinier Post Jun 27 '16 at 09:10
Did not work for me - Linux Mint 18.3 (based on Ubuntu 16.04) – olfek May 27 '18 at 17:34
Great it works for me. – Vinh Trieu Oct 28 '18 at 03:00

score 23 · Answer 2 · answered Aug 12 '11 at 09:14

23

This should be enough,:

 update-rc.d ssh enable # sets the default runlevels to on 
 update-rc.d ssh disable # sets all to off

answered Aug 12 '11 at 09:14

hhlp

42,002

Does this work with an upstart job or just old sys v init scripts? – komputes Aug 12 '11 at 16:12
This should be enough, even if you're using upstart (dependency-base booting) – hhlp Aug 13 '11 at 09:28
It says System start/stop links for /etc/init.d/ssh do not exist. – fikr4n Feb 28 '16 at 00:57

Bryan Agee · Answer 3 · 2011-08-11T23:39:20.273

10

In your /etc/init/ssh.conf, comment out the start on line:

# ssh - OpenBSD Secure Shell server
#
# The OpenSSH server provides secure shell access to the system.

description     "OpenSSH server"

#start on filesystem or runlevel [2345]
stop on runlevel [!2345]

respawn
respawn limit 10 5
umask 022

edited Aug 11 '11 at 23:39

answered Aug 11 '11 at 23:17

Bryan Agee

3,356

1

I'm of the opinion that in general it's better to use the more generic mechanisms that @komputes and hhlp mention. Though this is fine for a single case. – belacqua Jun 19 '12 at 17:25

score 9 · Answer 4 · edited Apr 14 '17 at 14:59

9

For system having systemd the proper way to do it is

sudo systemctl disable ssh.service

then

sudo systemctl stop ssh.service

edited Apr 14 '17 at 14:59

Anwar

76,649

answered Apr 14 '17 at 09:32

Jocelyn

287

1

This broke my sshd on 16.04: after that command systemctl enable ssh.service reports "File not found" and I had to purge and reinstall sshd to get it working. – BeeOnRope Nov 21 '17 at 18:04
You can start the service with sudo systemctl start ssh.service and use systemctl status ssh.service to see if it running or not. – Stuart Nov 06 '20 at 14:06

score 8 · Answer 5 · answered Jan 24 '16 at 20:36

note to the reader:

for me (ubuntu 14.xx) only Bryan Agee's answer worked: /etc/init/ssh.conf: comment out the "start on filesystem or runlevel..." line

why won't the others do?

sudo mv /etc/init/ssh.conf /etc/init/ssh.conf.disabled

will result in completly deactivating the service. It is then not startable through "service ssh start" anymore.

update-rc.d ssh enable # sets the default runlevels to on

does simply not work (perhaps uses different autostart routine)

/etc/init/ssh.conf.override with "manual"

simply doesnt work

touch /etc/ssh/sshd_not_to_be_run

also completly disables the system

sudo apt-get install bum

nice software, but it doesn't show ssh, so nothing to do here

person questioning: why are the above answeres even here? is the start system so complicated or does nobody tries his solutions? oO

And we're only talking about Ubuntu 14.04. Now try to find a universal solution... — LatinSuD, Apr 18 '17 at 10:58

score 4 · Answer 6 · answered Aug 12 '11 at 09:27

4

sudo apt-get install bum

Start bum with administrative privileges, disable openssh-server, confirm it, done.

answered Aug 12 '11 at 09:27

RobinJ

8,910

score 3 · Answer 7 · answered Nov 05 '12 at 18:54

3

For versions with ssh started by upstart, run touch /etc/ssh/sshd_not_to_be_run. The upstart init script checks for this file and, if existent, does not start sshd.

answered Nov 05 '12 at 18:54

Daenyth

768

score 3 · Answer 8 · edited Nov 23 '15 at 07:54

3

The manual method provided /etc/init/ssh.config.override method does not work for me using Ubuntu 14.04.03. sshd still starts automatically.

The /etc/ssh/sshd_not_to_be_run method prevents manual sshd start.

I had to use Brian Agee's method of removing the "start on" on line of /etc/init/ssh.conf. Then to manually start sshd:

sudo service ssh start

edited Nov 23 '15 at 07:54

snoop

4,040
9
40
58

answered Nov 21 '15 at 18:12

Robert Bailey

31

score 2 · Answer 9 · answered Nov 28 '16 at 23:05

2

I had the same question and here's what I did about it. It's a bit of a hack, perhaps, but it works well enough, and you don't need to compromise the program in any way. Put the following in your crontab:

@reboot sudo service ssh stop

This tells cron to stop ssh every time you turn on your computer. Using ssh to connect to another computer isn't affected, as this only turns off the server service. And if you want to re-enable it for a short while, all you have to do is:

sudo service ssh start

Just remember to turn it back off when you're done!

answered Nov 28 '16 at 23:05

ARandomScientist

21

This works on my Xubuntu 16.04 system which, of course, uses systemd. I don't believe this will work on pre-systemd Ubuntu systems. – ARandomScientist Nov 28 '16 at 23:14
1

Instead of making a cron-job, the proper way would be to disable it with sudo systemctl disable sshd.service, yet as you yourself mentioned your init system is way different to the one in the question. all relevant info about older init systems can be found in the first two answers in this post https://askubuntu.com/questions/19320/how-to-enable-or-disable-services#19324 – d1bro Nov 28 '16 at 23:33

How do I disable SSHD from starting automatically?

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