Linux Administration Cookbook

Disallowing root login

Some distributions deny root login by default, and this is widely considered a good idea. Here, we have a user (vagrant) that we can use to get around so that we don't need to log in as root.

Find the line with PermitRootLogin:

#LoginGraceTime 2m#PermitRootLogin yes#StrictModes yes

Change it to no:

#LoginGraceTime 2mPermitRootLogin no#StrictModes yes

Restart the SSH daemon:

[vagrant@centos2 ~]$ sudo systemctl restart sshd

This does not disallow local root login, so in a pinch, you can still connect to a console (or plug a keyboard and mouse into the physical machine) and log in with the root user locally.