When a Linux user wants to secure the system, the most common method is always using their login password. However, we know this method is not very reliable as there are many methods to hack a traditional password. To increase the security level, we can use a USB device like an authentication token, which will be used to log in to the system.
To follow these steps, we need to have a USB storage device and Pluggable Authentication Modules (PAM) downloaded on the Linux system. Most Linux systems have PAM in the form of precompiled packages, which can be accessed from the relevant repository.
By using any type of USB storage device and PAM, we can create the authentication token:
- To start with, we first need to install the packages required for PAM USB authentication. To do so, we run this command:
$ sudo apt-get install pamusb-tools libpam-usb
- Once the packages are installed, we have to configure the USB device to use PAM...