SCP(1) General Commands Manual SCP(1) NAME scp – secure copy (remote file copy program) SYNOPSIS scp [-12346BCpqrv] [-c cipher] [-F ssh_config] [-i identity_file] [-l limit] [-o ssh_option] [-P port] [-S program] [[user@]host1:]file1 ... [[user@]host2:]file2 DESCRIPTION scp copies files between hosts on a network. It uses ssh(1) for data transfer, and uses the same authentication and provides the same security as ssh(1). scp will ask for passwords or passphrases if they are needed for authentication. File names may contain a user and host specification to indicate that the file is to be copied to/from that host. Local file names can be made explicit using absolute or relative pathnames to avoid scp treating file names containing ‘:’ as host specifiers. Copies between two remote hosts are also permitted. The options are as follows: -1 Forces scp to use protocol 1. -2 Forces scp to use protocol 2. -3 Copies between two remote hosts are transferred through the local host. Without this option the data is copied directly between the two remote hosts. Note that this option disables the progress meter. -4 Forces scp to use IPv4 addresses only. -6 Forces scp to use IPv6 addresses only. -B Selects batch mode (prevents asking for passwords or passphrases). -C Compression enable. Passes the -C flag to ssh(1) to enable compression. -c cipher Selects the cipher to use for encrypting the data transfer. This option is directly passed to ssh(1). -F ssh_config Specifies an alternative per-user configuration file for ssh. This option is directly passed to ssh(1). -i identity_file Selects the file from which the identity (private key) for public key authentication is read. This option is directly passed to ssh(1). -l limit Limits the used bandwidth, specified in Kbit/s. -o ssh_option Can be used to pass options to ssh in the format used in ssh_config(5). This is useful for specifying options for which there is no separate scp command-line flag. For full details of the options listed below, and their possible values, see ssh_config(5). AddressFamily BatchMode BindAddress CanonicalDomains CanonicalizeFallbackLocal CanonicalizeHostname CanonicalizeMaxDots CanonicalizePermittedCNAMEs ChallengeResponseAuthentication CheckHostIP Cipher Ciphers Compression CompressionLevel ConnectionAttempts ConnectTimeout ControlMaster ControlPath ControlPersist GlobalKnownHostsFile GSSAPIAuthentication GSSAPIDelegateCredentials HashKnownHosts Host HostbasedAuthentication HostKeyAlgorithms HostKeyAlias HostName IdentityFile IdentitiesOnly IPQoS KbdInteractiveAuthentication KbdInteractiveDevices KexAlgorithms LogLevel MACs NoHostAuthenticationForLocalhost NumberOfPasswordPrompts PasswordAuthentication PKCS11Provider Port PreferredAuthentications Protocol ProxyCommand PubkeyAuthentication RekeyLimit RhostsRSAAuthentication RSAAuthentication SendEnv ServerAliveInterval ServerAliveCountMax StrictHostKeyChecking TCPKeepAlive UsePrivilegedPort User UserKnownHostsFile VerifyHostKeyDNS -P port Specifies the port to connect to on the remote host. Note that this option is written with a capital ‘P’, because -p is already reserved for preserving the times and modes of the file. -p Preserves modification times, access times, and modes from the original file. -q Quiet mode: disables the progress meter as well as warning and diagnostic messages from ssh(1). -r Recursively copy entire directories. Note that scp follows symbolic links encountered in the tree traversal. -S program Name of program to use for the encrypted connection. The program must understand ssh(1) options. -v Verbose mode. Causes scp and ssh(1) to print debugging messages about their progress. This is helpful in debugging connection, authentication, and configuration problems. EXIT STATUS The scp utility exits 0 on success, and >0 if an error occurs. SEE ALSO sftp(1), ssh(1), ssh-add(1), ssh-agent(1), ssh-keygen(1), ssh_config(5), sshd(8) HISTORY scp is based on the rcp program in BSD source code from the Regents of the University of California. AUTHORS Timo Rinne Tatu Ylonen BSD January 16, 2015 BSD