stderr: Host key verification failed | GitHub | Jenkins | Windows

Question

I'm setting up Jenkins with GitHub. Following is what I have done so far:

1. Installed Jenkins and Git on one of our Windows VM's.
2. Received a common user. I am using this user for github.
3. Setup ssh keys with this user and added these ssh keys to github account.
4. Copied Git SSH keys to Jenkins folder also.

After all above when I try to run the job [the job just pull a repo], I'm getting the following error:

Building in workspace D:\Jenkins\workspace\test C:\Program Files\Git\bin\git.exe rev-parse --is-inside-work-tree # timeout=10 Fetching changes from the remote Git repository C:\Program Files\Git\bin\git.exe config remote.origin.url git@github.ABC.com:ABC/REPO.git # timeout=10 Fetching upstream changes from git@github.ABC.com:ABC/REPO.git C:\Program Files\Git\bin\git.exe --version # timeout=10 using GIT_ASKPASS to set credentials C:\Program Files\Git\bin\git.exe fetch --tags --force --progress git@github.ABC.com:ABC/REPO.git +refs/heads/:refs/remotes/origin/ ERROR: Error fetching remote repo 'origin' hudson.plugins.git.GitException: Failed to fetch from git@github.ABC.com:ABC/REPO.git at hudson.plugins.git.GitSCM.fetchFrom(GitSCM.java:888) at hudson.plugins.git.GitSCM.retrieveChanges(GitSCM.java:1155) at hudson.plugins.git.GitSCM.checkout(GitSCM.java:1186) at hudson.scm.SCM.checkout(SCM.java:504) at hudson.model.AbstractProject.checkout(AbstractProject.java:1208) at hudson.model.AbstractBuild$AbstractBuildExecution.defaultCheckout(AbstractBuild.java:574) at jenkins.scm.SCMCheckoutStrategy.checkout(SCMCheckoutStrategy.java:86) at hudson.model.AbstractBuild$AbstractBuildExecution.run(AbstractBuild.java:499) at hudson.model.Run.execute(Run.java:1810) at hudson.model.FreeStyleBuild.run(FreeStyleBuild.java:43) at hudson.model.ResourceController.execute(ResourceController.java:97) at hudson.model.Executor.run(Executor.java:429) Caused by: hudson.plugins.git.GitException: Command "C:\Program Files\Git\bin\git.exe fetch --tags --force --progress git@github.ABC.com:ABC/REPO.git +refs/heads/:refs/remotes/origin/" returned status code 128: stdout: stderr: Host key verification failed. fatal: Could not read from remote repository.

Please make sure you have the correct access rights and the repository exists.

at org.jenkinsci.plugins.gitclient.CliGitAPIImpl.launchCommandIn(CliGitAPIImpl.java:2042) at org.jenkinsci.plugins.gitclient.CliGitAPIImpl.launchCommandWithCredentials(CliGitAPIImpl.java:1761) at org.jenkinsci.plugins.gitclient.CliGitAPIImpl.access$400(CliGitAPIImpl.java:72) at org.jenkinsci.plugins.gitclient.CliGitAPIImpl$1.execute(CliGitAPIImpl.java:442) at hudson.plugins.git.GitSCM.fetchFrom(GitSCM.java:886) ... 11 more ERROR: Error fetching remote repo 'origin' Finished: FAILURE

Answer 1

Make sure to use the Jenkins SSH credentials in order to record the private key with that plugin.

Then you can use that credential for your job.

In the OP's case, there were two issues:

• private key generate with 4096 bits (instead of the default 1024)
• private key generate with the new OPENSSL format (instead of the legacy OpenSSH one), as explained here.
• make sure the private key is registered in the global scope (as a global credential):