randomart in ssh (nerd alert!)

Today I learned about randomart in ssh. It generates random ASCII art from ssh keys. Think old-skool BBS art generated with letters, numbers, and punctuation. SSH is a command-line utility for connecting to remote servers. It uses cryptographic keys to secure the connection so it can't be eavesdropped on by folks in the middle (using a network sniffer, for example).
Anyway, ssh keys are long strings of characters, and they are easy to verify with a computer, but difficult for humans to verify visually. Changing even one character in a key makes it into a different key, and that would be hard for humans to detect easily and routinely.
So, the authors of ssh, an Open Source tool, implemented a feature that generates a unique picture (but the same one every time for a specific key). If you regularly ssh to a server, it's anticipated that you'd notice any changes to that picture.

The key fingerprint is:
SHA256:o5lJ57gY1oUS+VIMP/KU7T5varCH+6Xsc+M0/BXyHUw HaX0r@shell
The key's randomart image is:
+---[RSA 2048]----+
|    .            |
|     = o         |
|    + B .      E |
|     B +      o  |
|    o = S   . .o |
|     =.@ o   o o.|
|    o B++ =   o .|
|   . ooo+*+o .   |
|    . o***o..    |
+----[SHA256]-----+

Read more and turn it on for your ssh config. Pretty cool! https://superuser.com/questions/22535/what-is-randomart-produced-by-ssh-keygen <- lots more cool links from here.

Note: unless you are a nerd who uses the command line in Linux or MacOS, you will not likely find this useful, but I hope you still find it interesting.

Also: https://blog.benjojo.co.uk/post/ssh-randomart-how-does-it-work-art

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