Why does passwd command show "UNIX password"?
It says UNIX because you're changing the password for authentication provided by the pam_unix
PAM module. Quoting the manpage:
NAME
pam_unix - Module for traditional password authentication
SYNOPSIS
pam_unix.so [...]
DESCRIPTION
This is the standard Unix authentication module. It uses standard calls
from the system's libraries to retrieve and set account information as
well as authentication. Usually this is obtained from the /etc/passwd
and the /etc/shadow file as well if shadow is enabled.
It is related to Unix in that it uses the traditional files /etc/passwd
and /etc/shadow
as the source of authentication.
If you used another PAM module, like pam_ldap
for LDAP authentication, it would say LDAP instead of UNIX:
$ passwd
(current) LDAP Password:
New password:
Retype new password:
passwd: password updated successfully