KEYSERV(8)

NAME
keyserv - server for storing private encryption keys

SYNOPSIS
keyserv [-d] [-D] [-n] [-p path] [-v]

DEPRECATION NOTICE
keyserv is deprecated and is not available as of FreeBSD 15.0.

DESCRIPTION
The keyserv utility is a daemon that is used for storing the private encryption keys of each user logged into the system. These encryption keys are used for accessing secure network services such as secure NFS.

Normally, root's key is read from the file /etc/.rootkey when the daemon is started. This is useful during power-fail reboots when no one is around to type a password.

If a client with no secret key calls keyserv, then the key of user nobody is used instead as the default key.

The following options are available:

-d  Disable the use of default keys for nobody.

-D  Run in debugging mode and log all requests to keyserv.

-n  Root's secret key is not read from /etc/.rootkey. Instead, keyserv prompts the user for the password to decrypt root's key stored in the /etc/publickey database and then stores the decrypted key in /etc/.rootkey for future use. This option is useful if the /etc/.rootkey file ever gets out of date or corrupted.

-p path
    Specify where to search for libdes.so.3. Default is /usr/lib.

-v  Display status of DES support (enabled/disabled).

FILES
/etc/.rootkey
/usr/lib/libdes.so.3

SEE ALSO
keylogin(1), keylogout(1), publickey(5)

HISTORY
The keyserv utility was removed from FreeBSD 15.0.