I'm trying to copy compressed access_log.gz files from /var/log/httpd from a remote server to a local one so that our marketing guy can download them. There's probably a better way to do this... but this is what I have tried so far and having problem after problem Have created a webuser account on both servers and added webuser ALL=(root)NOPASSWD:/usr/bin/rsync at the bottom of /etc/sudoers file In /home/webuser I placed this file called sync-log ssh -t webuser@ipaddressofremoteserver rsync -varltpgzhP --rsync-path='sudo rsync' \/var/log/httpd/*.gz webuser@ipaddressofremoteserver:/var/www/html/accesslogs/A When I run the file as webuser, this is the output:- webuser@ipaddressofremoteserver's password: sudo: invalid option -- - protocol version mismatch -- is your shell clean? (see the rsync man page for an explanation) rsync error: protocol incompatibility (code 2) at compat.c(171) [sender=3.0.6] I have generated and copied the keys from the remote server to the local, ssh-copy-id -i ~/.ssh/id_rsa.pub remote-host. In the known_hosts file of the local server i see the key of the remote server listed, yet, when i run the sync file i'm still asked for the password... not sure why.. any guidance would be greatly appreciated.