Running an SFTP server over SSH-1 is not platform-independent as SSH-1 does not support the concept of subsystems. It is possible, however, to run it over SSH-1 (and some implementations support this) or other data streams. SFTP is most often used as subsystem of SSH protocol version 2 implementations, having been designed by the same working group.

The protocol itself does not provide authentication and security it expects the underlying protocol to secure this. It is sometimes confused with Simple File Transfer Protocol. SFTP is not FTP run over SSH, but rather a new protocol designed from the ground up by the IETF SECSH working group. In SFTP, the file transfer can be easily terminated without terminating a session like other mechanisms do. While SCP is most frequently implemented on Unix platforms, SFTP servers are commonly available on most platforms. SFTP attempts to be more platform-independent than SCP with SCP, for instance, the expansion of wildcards specified by the client is up to the server, whereas SFTP's design avoids this problem. There is also support for all UNIX file types, including symbolic links. An SFTP client's extra capabilities include resuming interrupted transfers, directory listings, and remote file removal.

This protocol assumes that it is run over a secure channel, such as SSH, that the server has already authenticated the client, and that the identity of the client user is available to the protocol.Ĭompared to the SCP protocol, which only allows file transfers, the SFTP protocol allows for a range of operations on remote files which make it more like a remote file system protocol. The IETF Internet Draft states that, even though this protocol is described in the context of the SSH-2 protocol, it could be used in a number of different applications, such as secure file transfer over Transport Layer Security (TLS) and transfer of management information in VPN applications. It was designed by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) as an extension of the Secure Shell protocol (SSH) version 2.0 to provide secure file transfer capabilities. In computing, the SSH File Transfer Protocol (also known as Secure File Transfer Protocol or SFTP) is a network protocol that provides file access, file transfer, and file management over any reliable data stream. Network protocol that provides file management over any reliable data stream

Total commander sftp connection