[PATCH bpf-next 00/13] BPF interface for applying Landlock rulesets

[Paul Moore]

On Fri, Jul 31, 2026 at 5:15 PM Justin Suess <utilityemal77 at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Fri, Jul 31, 2026 at 04:30:39PM -0400, Paul Moore wrote:
> > On Thu, Jul 30, 2026 at 10:21 PM Justin Suess <utilityemal77 at gmail.com> wrote:
> > >
> > > Howdy,
> > >
> > > This series lets BPF programs apply an existing, userspace-created
> > > Landlock ruleset to a program during exec.  The goal is unchanged from
> > > the RFC [1]: BPF does not create, inspect, or mutate Landlock policy,
> > > it only decides whether a ruleset that was already created and
> > > validated through Landlock's existing userspace API should be applied,
> > > based on runtime exec context.
> > >
> > > Motivation
> > > ---
> > > Deploying Landlock today requires the sandboxed program's
> > > cooperation.  A process can only restrict itself, so applying a
> > > policy system-wide means wrapping every launch path with a helper
> > > that calls landlock_restrict_self(2) before exec, and anything
> > > spawned outside those wrappers runs unconfined.  Supervising exec
> > > from userspace instead (ptrace, seccomp user notifications) is racy
> > > and slow.  Meanwhile, the tools that do enforce system-wide policy
> > > with BPF LSM programs today (container security agents such as
> > > KubeArmor and Tetragon) end up reimplementing path-based access
> > > control in BPF, fraught with horrors of path reconstruction, bind
> > > mounts, rename races, and worse, which is exactly the problem Landlock
> > > already solves in the kernel, with maintained and versioned semantics.
> > >
> > > This series composes BPF and Landlock along their natural grain.  The
> > > intended deployment: a supervisor creates one ruleset per policy
> > > class through the existing syscalls, a syscall BPF program parks
> > > them in map kptr fields, and an LSM BPF program picks which (if
> > > any) to apply to an execution based on its runtime context.  The
> > > policy semantics stay Landlock's; BPF contributes only the
> > > programmable decision of when and to whom.  Deciding inside the
> > > exec path closes the race a userspace supervisor cannot: the
> > > policy is in place before the first instruction of the new program
> > > runs.
> >
> > Discretionary models are fun, and useful in certain situations, but
> > they do have their limitations ;)  To be fair, mandatory models have
> > their limitations too :)
> >
>
> This series does kind of blur the lines between DAC and MAC
> a little... interesting thought.
>
> > I've only just barely skimmed some of the patches in this patchset,
> > and I didn't have a chance to fully read your reply in the previous
> > revision yet, so I wanted to get you a quick response here ... as
> > incomplete as it may be.
> >
> > As you may, or may not have seen, there is currently an ongoing debate
> > regarding the location of LSM kfuncs that will impact this patchset.
> > Sadly, we don't appear to be approaching an agreement on this issue
> > which introduces some additional risk to this patchset.  We'll have to
> > see how that ends up, but I just wanted you to be aware of the
> > situation.
> >
>
> I'll hold off on further iterations until that's resolved.
>
> Moving these kfuncs anywhere fortunately amounts to a trivial
> cut/paste on end anyway.
>
> > I need to look closer at both the LSM hooks and the BPF kfuncs before
> > I can really definitively comment on them.  It looks like there has
> > been some progress towards an LSM agnostic interface, but I'm
> > concerned more work might be needed.  However, as I said earlier, a
> > closer examination is needed and perhaps that will reveal something
> > different.
> >
> > It's also worth mentioning that this functionality looks an awful lot
> > like a call to lsm_set_self_attr(LSM_ATTR_EXEC,
> > <lsm_ctx:LSM_ID_LANDLOCK>, size, 0) with a lsm_ctx::ctx set to a
> > policy fd.  Once again, perhaps a closer inspection will reveal that
> > it is nothing like that, but it kept popping into my head while
> > reading things so I wanted to mention it, especially as it a lot of
> > the framework infrastructure already exists.
>
> They were the direct inspiration for the hooks (and set/getprocattr).
>
> Main difference being the object in the hook is a trusted kernel pointer
> rather than a lsm_ctx blob or fd. We can't use an fd here since the
> sandboxed task and supervisor don't share an fd table.
>
> I'll wait for your full review, no rush.

I appreciate your patience, thanks.

-- 
paul-moore.com