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Cisco ASA Series CLI Configuration Guide
 
Chapter 1      Configuring AAA Servers and the Local Database
  Configuring AAA
Command Purpose
Step 1
username username {nopassword | password password 
[mschap]} [privilege priv_level]
Example:
hostname(config)# username exampleuser1 privilege 
1
Creates the user account. The username username 
keyword is a string from 4 to 64 characters long.
The password password keyword is a string from 3 to 32 
characters long. The mschap keyword specifies that the 
password is converted to Unicode and hashed using 
MD4 after you enter it. Use this keyword if users are 
authenticated using MS-CHAPv1 or MS-CHAPv2. The 
privilege level argument sets the privilege level, which 
ranges from 0 to 15. The default is 2. This privilege level 
is used with command authorization.
Caution If you do not use command authorization (the 
aaa authorization console LOCAL 
command), then the default level 2 allows 
management access to privileged EXEC 
mode. If you want to limit access to privileged 
EXEC mode, either set the privilege level to 0 
or 1, or use the service-type command (see 
Step 5).
The nopassword keyword creates a user account with no 
password.
The encrypted and nt-encrypted keywords are 
typically for display only. When you define a password 
in the username command, the ASA encrypts it when it 
saves it to the configuration for security purposes. When 
you enter the show running-config command, the 
username command does not show the actual password; 
it shows the encrypted password followed by the 
encrypted or nt-encrypted keyword (when you specify 
mschap). For example, if you enter the password “test,” 
the show running-config output would appear as 
something similar to the following:
username user1 password DLaUiAX3l78qgoB5c7iVNw== 
nt-encrypted
The only time you would actually enter the encrypted or 
nt-encrypted keyword at the CLI is if you are cutting 
and pasting a configuration file for use in another ASA, 
and you are using the same password.