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Spiped – secure pipe for SSH, SMTP, etc.

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Re: Spiped – secure pipe for SSH, SMTP, etc.

#4
post #3

> This is similar to 'ssh -L' functionality, but does not use SSH and requires a pre-shared symmetric key. I already have SSH set up and functional, what advantage does spiped offer?

iirc spiped uses TLS/OpenSSL for securing the connection, the symmetric key avoids the key-exchange and worrying about certificates, and therefore is better capable of efficiently using the connection than SSH by itself.

Because it's much simpler it's also a good way to expose a system to the internet, although Wireguard with a PSK is a very similar and possibly superior solution.

Re: Spiped – secure pipe for SSH, SMTP, etc.

#5
post #3

> This is similar to 'ssh -L' functionality, but does not use SSH and requires a pre-shared symmetric key. I already have SSH set up and functional, what advantage does spiped offer?

I'm presuming this is pretty similar to https://www.stunnel.org

We would use stunnel rather than SSH for non-interactive usages. Having an active stunnel running all the time is safer than requiring a full SSH session being active.

Re: Spiped – secure pipe for SSH, SMTP, etc.

#6
post #4
post #3

> This is similar to 'ssh -L' functionality, but does not use SSH and requires a pre-shared symmetric key. I already have SSH set up and functional, what advantage does spiped offer?

iirc spiped uses TLS/OpenSSL for securing the connection, the symmetric key avoids the key-exchange and worrying about certificates, and therefore is better capable of efficiently using the connection than SSH by itself. Because it's much simpler it's also a good way to expose a system to the internet, although Wireguard with a PSK is a very similar and possibly superior solution.

spiped does not in fact use TLS.

A subthread from 2014:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7540288

Re: Spiped – secure pipe for SSH, SMTP, etc.

#7
post #3

> This is similar to 'ssh -L' functionality, but does not use SSH and requires a pre-shared symmetric key. I already have SSH set up and functional, what advantage does spiped offer?

I'm presuming this is pretty similar to https://www.stunnel.org We would use stunnel rather than SSH for non-interactive usages. Having an active stunnel running all the time is safer than requiring a full SSH session being active.

stunnel predates spiped by quite some time; spiped is a reaction to stunnel --- specifically, a network hole punch for people who trust neither OpenSSL nor OpenSSH's attack surface.

Today, most people would just use WireGuard for this.

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