It seems to be a growing trend for companies to NOT allow ssh on their shared servers.

The claim is that this increases security and results in better performance.

Can anyone please tell me exactly why this is true?

Consider the following:

1) SSH service is still running, right? (ie: root can still open an ssh session, so the machine is still running the software,e tc..)

2) Many control panels allow access to cron setup. (ie: CPanel) So I could run any script by just uploading the file, making it executable, and then running it via cron. How is this different than directly via ssh? (other than obvious user interaction, etc.)

I'm curious because I've had a number of users asking about this.. and also because if it is really so good for the servers, then why don't all shared hosting providers limit SSH to increase performance and security, etc?

Thanks!

Right now we only offer SSH to users who request it.

There is many users that try to do malicious things via SSH and that is why most companies do not allow it.

As you said, there is ways people may still be able to access SSH that are more advanced, but most script kiddies out there that are only out to cause trouble aren't that advanced or just do not want to waste there time.

I think a lot of it has to do with how the shared servers are setup. Depending on the method which you 'jail' the various accounts, giving SSH doesn't have to pose any problem or risk. Which is why we have different plans, some without SSH access and others that clients have full root access.

I think the main concern is that on some plans, if you give someone SSH access, they can try to exploit the server or cause problems for other clients.
This is probably the reason that a number of hosts only offer it to clients who make a legitimate case for you.
But for those 'malicious' clients, that's why you have SA's to make sure that all servers are running smoothly and no problems arise.