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Shield Reference [2.1] » Getting Started with Shield » Enable Message Authentication
«  Control Access with Basic Authentication     Enable Auditing  »

Enable Message Authentication

Message authentication verifies that a message has not been tampered with or corrupted in transit.

To enable message authentication:

  1. Run the syskeygen tool from ES_HOME without any options: 

    bin/shield/syskeygen

    This creates a system key file in CONFIG_DIR/shield/system_key.

  2. Copy the genererated system key to the rest of the nodes in the cluster.
Important

The system key is a symmetric key, so the same key must be on every node in the cluster.

Now that you’ve enabled message authentication, you might also want to Enable Auditing to keep track of attempted and successful interactions with your Elasticsearch cluster.

«  Control Access with Basic Authentication     Enable Auditing  »