For about 6 months after getting my hosted webserver, I logged in via ssh with no problems and set myself up with a private key and so on. A few months ago though when I was too busy to sort it out, ssh stopped working. I get a connection and then it hangs. Worse, I honestly can't think of what it could be that changed.

Here's the verbose output when I try to login:

Then it just sits there unresponsive until I kill it off. Fortunately I can still get into the webserver using the web utils from the hosting company, so I should be able to fix it, but I don't know where to start. There's nothing similar posted here on the forum, and I'm pretty sure it's not my firewall since I dropped it (iptables) and still couldn't get it, yet I can handshake with the server.

I'd be massively grateful for any advice,

thanks

a bit more info, just in case no-one's answering because I have left off key information (but my guess is, you're all watching the presedential election, right).

ssh -V:
OpenSSH_3.4p1 Debian 1:3.4p1-1.woody.3, SSH protocols 1.5/2.0, OpenSSL 0x0090603f

I also tried logging in from another machine - same result.

cat /etc/ssh/sshd_config
# Package generated configuration file
# See the sshd(8) manpage for defails

# What ports, IPs and protocols we listen for
Port 22
# Uncomment the next entry to accept IPv6 traffic.
#ListenAddress ::
#ListenAddress 0.0.0.0
Protocol 1,2
# HostKeys for protocol version 2
HostKey /etc/ssh/ssh_host_rsa_key
HostKey /etc/ssh/ssh_host_dsa_key
# Lifetime and size of ephemeral version 1 server key
KeyRegenerationInterval 3600
ServerKeyBits 768

# Logging
SyslogFacility AUTH
LogLevel INFO

# Authentication:
LoginGraceTime 600
PermitRootLogin yes
StrictModes yes

RSAAuthentication yes
PubkeyAuthentication yes
#AuthorizedKeysFile %h/.ssh/authorized_keys

# rhosts authentication should not be used
RhostsAuthentication no
# Don't read the user's ~/.rhosts and ~/.shosts files
IgnoreRhosts yes
# For this to work you will also need host keys in /etc/ssh_known_hosts
RhostsRSAAuthentication no
# similar for protocol version 2
HostbasedAuthentication no
# Uncomment if you don't trust ~/.ssh/known_hosts for RhostsRSAAuthentication
#IgnoreUserKnownHosts yes

# To enable empty passwords, change to yes (NOT RECOMMENDED)
PermitEmptyPasswords no

# Uncomment to disable s/key passwords
#ChallengeResponseAuthentication no

# To disable tunneled clear text passwords, change to no here!
PasswordAuthentication yes

# Use PAM authentication via keyboard-interactive so PAM modules can
# properly interface with the user
PAMAuthenticationViaKbdInt yes

# To change Kerberos options
#KerberosAuthentication no
#KerberosOrLocalPasswd yes
#AFSTokenPassing no
#KerberosTicketCleanup no

# Kerberos TGT Passing does only work with the AFS kaserver
#KerberosTgtPassing yes

X11Forwarding no
X11DisplayOffset 10
PrintMotd no
PrintLastLog no
KeepAlive yes
#UseLogin no

#MaxStartups 10:30:60
#Banner /etc/issue.net
#ReverseMappingCheck yes

Subsystem sftp /usr/lib/sftp-server
ReverseMappingCheck no
GatewayPorts no
AllowTcpForwarding yes

I think I've got a more general problem than just ssh.

ftp won't show me the password prompt. And it's only on this one box. So I'm going to start a thread over in the networking forum.