Date: Tue, 11 Dec 2007 11:26:29 -0800 (PST)
From: Casey Schaufler <casey@schaufler-ca.com>
Reply-To: casey@schaufler-ca.com
Subject: Re: [PATCH 08/28] SECURITY: Allow kernel services to override LSM settings for task actions [try #2]
To: Stephen Smalley <sds@tycho.nsa.gov>, casey@schaufler-ca.com
Cc: David Howells <dhowells@redhat.com>, Karl MacMillan <kmacmill@redhat.com>,
       viro@ftp.linux.org.uk, hch@infradead.org, Trond.Myklebust@netapp.com,
       linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org, selinux@tycho.nsa.gov,
       linux-security-module@vger.kernel.org
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--- Stephen Smalley <sds@tycho.nsa.gov> wrote:

> On Mon, 2007-12-10 at 14:26 -0800, Casey Schaufler wrote:
> > --- Stephen Smalley <sds@tycho.nsa.gov> wrote:
> > 
> > > On Mon, 2007-12-10 at 21:08 +0000, David Howells wrote:
> > > > Stephen Smalley <sds@tycho.nsa.gov> wrote:
> > > > 
> > > > > Otherwise, only other issue I have with this interface is it won't
> > > > > generalize to dealing with nfsd, where we want to set the acting
> context
> > > > > to a context we obtain from or determine based upon the client.
> > > > 
> > > > Are you speaking of security_kernel_act_as() and
> security_create_files_as()
> > > > specifically?  Or the task_struct::act_as override pointer in general?
> > > 
> > > security_kernel_act_as()
> > > 
> > > > I don't really know how nfsd wants to obtain and set its LSM context,
> so
> > > it's
> > > > a bit difficult for me to make something that works for nfsd as well as
> > > > cachefiles.
> > > 
> > > It would get a context from the client or from a local configuration
> > > that would map security-unaware clients to a default context, and then
> > > want to assume that context for the particular operation.  No transition
> > > involved.
> > 
> > I would expect that the operation would be more sophisticated
> > than that. You certainly aren't going to use what comes from
> > the other side without any processing, and I expect you'll have
> > some sort of operation on anything you pull from a config file
> > before you actually apply it.
> 
> Yes, that's true - the contexts would be subjected to a permission
> check.  But that's separable from the act of setting it as the task's
> acting security state (and needs to be separated, as the precise check
> will vary depending on the situation - cachefiles is going to apply a
> different sort of check than nfsd).
> 
> > > > > Why can't cachefilesd just push a context into the kernel and pass
> that
> > > > > into the hook as the acting context,
> > > > 
> > > > How does cachefilesd come up with such a context?  Grab it from
> > > > /etc/cachefilesd.conf?
> > > 
> > > >From a config file whose pathname would be provided by libselinux (ala
> > > the way in which dbusd imports contexts), or directly as a context
> > > returned by a libselinux function.  Has to be done that way so that it
> > > can be set differently for different policy types (strict, targeted,
> > > mls).
> > 
> > Unless you've got an LSM other than SELinux, of course. If
> > cachefilesd is going to be responsible for maintaining this
> > magic context there needs to be an LSM interface for it, not
> > just an SELinux interface.
> 
> LSM is an in-kernel interface.  Here we are talking about a userspace
> interface for obtaining the right security label to use.  There is no
> equivalent to LSM in userspace as of yet.  Feel free to invent one, but
> don't ask the rest of us to do it or wait for it to materialize.

I am much more concerned with the interfaces used to pass the
information into the kernel. I would expect that to be LSM
independent, not a call into libselinux that resolves into a
selinuxfs operation, or it's netlink equivilant. It would be
unfortunate if the userland/kernel interface became an obstacle
to cachefiles being adopted.

> ...


Casey Schaufler
casey@schaufler-ca.com
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