safe-ssh-mcp

Safe SSH MCP Server

A secure and scoped SSH MCP server for executing read-only diagnostic commands over SSH.
In this project, "safe" refers specifically to host safety: the server is designed to prevent modifications to the remote system and reduce the risk of operational harm. It does NOT attempt to guarantee that command output cannot be misused by external agents.

Badges

- security check

Overview

The core philosophy behind this MCP server is safety first. Instead of providing an AI agent with an unrestricted bash shell, this server exposes only carefully curated, read-only commands for system diagnostics and monitoring.

Available Tools (Partial List)

• get_disk_free : df -h
• get_disk_usage : find <path> -mindepth 1 -maxdepth 1 -exec du -sh -- {} + 2>/dev/null | sort -rh | head -n 20
• get_dmesg : dmesg
• get_uptime : uptime
• get_current_datetime : date
• get_distroname_version : cat /etc/os-release
• get_systemd_list_all : systemctl list-units --all --no-pager
• get_systemd_list_failed : systemctl list-units --state=failed --no-pager
• get_systemd_list_timers : systemctl list-timers --no-pager
• get_crontab_tasks: crontab -l
• get_systemd_status : systemctl status {daemon}
• get_top : top -b -n 1 -c

Click to open full list of available tools

Example of invocation

okay, could u check disk usage on /root/ path with help of safe-ssh-mcp server on a remote myserver.mydomain.pro using root and /Users/myUser/.ssh/id_rsa to login?

Changelog

Project Contents

• mcp_ssh.py - the SSH MCP server
• mcp_config.ini - the server's config
• check_health_sse.py - check the server's tools and either it's up (sse transport)
• check_health_stdio.py - check the server's tools and either it's up (stdio transport)

Compatibility

Tested manually on Python3.11 running on MacOS against remote Ubuntu server
Autotested with Python 3.11 3.12 3.13 3.14

The MCP Registry

mcp-name: io.github.Areso/safe-ssh-mcp

The License

This project is licensed under the GNU AGPLv3 License.

Why AGPL?

This server acts as core infrastructure and contains no business logic. By using the AGPL license, we ensure that any security improvements, bug fixes, or new diagnostic tools added to the server are shared back with the open-source community.

Note for Client Developers

Because MCP clients communicate with this server via standard Inter-Process Communication (IPC) or network protocols (like HTTP/SSE), the AGPL license does not "infect" or restrict the client applications connecting to it.
You can safely connect proprietary, closed-source, or permissively licensed (e.g., MIT, Apache 2.0) AI agents to this server without violating the license terms.