Hello Phany,
What is FTPS?
In the 1990’s concern about internet security was growing, and in response Netscape created the Secure Sockets Layer (SSL, now known as TLS) protocol to protect communications over a network. SSL was applied to FTP to create FTPS. Like FTP, FTPS uses two connections, a command channel and a data channel. You can choose to encrypt both connections or only the data channel.
FTPS authenticates your connection using either a user ID and password, a certificate, or both. When connecting to a trading partner's FTPS server, your FTPS client will first check if the server's certificate is trusted. The certificate is considered trusted if either the certificate was signed by a known certificate authority (CA), or if the certificate was self-signed by your partner and you have a copy of their public certificate in your trusted key store. Your partner may also require that you supply a certificate when you connect to them. If your certificate isn’t signed by a third-party CA, your partner may allow you to self-sign your certificate, sending them the public portion beforehand to load into their trusted key store.
User ID authentication can be used with any combination of certificate and/or password authentication.
What is SFTP?
While FTPS adds a layer to the FTP protocol, SFTP is an entirely different protocol based on the network protocol SSH (Secure Shell) rather than FTP. Unlike both FTP and FTPS, SFTP uses only one connection and encrypts both authentication information and data files being transferred.
SFTP provides two methods for authenticating connections. Like FTP, you can simply use a user ID and password. However, with SFTP these credentials are encrypted, which gives it a major security advantage over FTP. The other authentication method you can use with SFTP is SSH keys. This involves first generating a SSH private key and public key. You then send your SSH public key to your trading partner and they load it onto their server and associate it with your account. When they connect to your SFTP server, their client software will transmit your public key to the server for authentication. If the public key matches your private key, along with any user or password supplied, then the authentication will be successful.
User ID authentication can be used with any combination of key and/or password authentication.
What is the difference between FTPS and SFTP?
We’ve established that both FTPS and SFTP offer strong protection through authentication options that FTP can’t provide. So why should you choose one over the other?
One major difference between FTPS and SFTP is that FTPS uses multiple port numbers. The first port, for the command channel, is used for authentication and passing commands. However, every time a file transfer request or directory listing request is made, another port number needs to be opened for the data channel. You and your trading partners will therefore have to open a range of ports in your firewalls to allow for FTPS connections, which can be a security risk for your network. SFTP needs only a single port number for all SFTP communications, making it easy to secure.
While both protocols have their benefits, we recommend SFTP thanks to its better usability with firewalls. For an enterprise, it is ideal to have a managed file transfer (MFT) solution that can manage, monitor, and automate file transfers using a variety of protocols, including FTPS and SFTP. MFT is extremely valuable if you have trading partners with different requirements, and it has additional features like detailed audit logs to help you comply with industry regulations.
Thank you.
