I initially had issues connecting via SSH, whilst using my laptop with a VirtualBox running Kali Linux. This is a tutorial on what worked for me to connect to the SSH user htb-student. Hopefully, it may help someone else.
Check to see if you have Openvpn installed. In the shell run:
openvpn --version
If you get the Openvpn version, move to step 2. If you didn’t run:
sudo apt-get install openvpn
Go to your hackthebox.com dashboard. Top right, profile photo, click VPN settings. Choose a server. Under Protocol, choose UDP 1337. Click download vpn connection file.
Change directory to the downloads folder, as this is where the vpn connection file is likely stored.
sudo openvpn academy-regular.ovpn
Open another shell window.
ssh htb-student@[Insert IP address here, do not include these square brackets]
It will ask you to enter your password. Enter it carefully, as it will not show up as you type.
It may ask if you want to continue connecting. Type yes. The output should be a short welcome page from Ubuntu and the shell user id should have changed to htb-student. You should now have access the system files for user htb-student.
Further confirmation checks of a successful vpn connection.
ifconfig
You should see tun0.
netstat -rn
You should see tun0 under Iface column.