[RFC PATCH 0/3] Allow access to confidential computing secret area

Andi Kleen ak at linux.intel.com
Thu May 20 22:02:16 UTC 2021


On 5/20/2021 3:56 AM, Dr. David Alan Gilbert wrote:
> * Brijes
> The nice thing about Dov's device/file is that it's a simple text file
> that userspace can then read the secret out of;  I'm not sure if there's
> anything similar in SNP (or for that matter TDX, cc'ing in Andi)

In TDX there are two different mechanisms:

- One is a ACPI table (SVKL) that allows to pass small pieces of data 
like keys from the BIOS. We have a little driver to read and clear the 
SVKL data. This would only be used if the TD BIOS does the negotiation 
for the secrets, which it doesn't do currently.

- In the other model the negotiation is done by a user program, just 
using another driver to issue calls to the TDX module. The calls just 
expose the TDREPORT, which encodes the attestation data, but does not 
actually include any secret. Then the negotiation for the secrets is 
done by the program, which can then pass it out to other programs (like 
mount for encrypted file systems). In such a case the secret is never 
touched by the kernel. At least initially we'll use the second option.

-Andi

57ccc1



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