Linuxconf uses special protocols to perform remote administration and cluster management. Those protocols may be encapsulated easily to enhance either connectivity and security.
One encapsulating tool is ssh (secure shell). ssh is a great replacement for commands like rlogin, rsh, rcp and telnet. It does basically the same thing (and more), but with added encryption and compression.
ssh is also very useful just to interconnect two processes remotely, by providing a secure (encrypted) link. This is the way Linuxconf is using it.
By setting special accounts on workstations and servers, you will be able to use them with Linuxconf without even knowing it. This is experimental and comments are welcome.
Linuxconf uses ssh to establish the link. This user account must have the shell
/usr/lib/linuxconf/lib/remadminshell
The account must NOT have a password. The idea is to trigger Linuxconf immediately, which will request a password using its GUI protocol.
You can use ssh access control to limit who may access your box this way. They need the root password, no matter what, to access it.