Date:	Wed, 06 Mar 2013 20:39:08 -0500
From:	Mimi Zohar <zohar@...ux.vnet.ibm.com>
To:	Vivek Goyal <vgoyal@...hat.com>
Cc:	Eric Paris <eparis@...isplace.org>,
	linux kernel mailing list <linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org>,
	LSM List <linux-security-module@...r.kernel.org>
Subject: Re: IMA: How to manage user space signing policy with others

On Wed, 2013-03-06 at 18:55 -0500, Vivek Goyal wrote:
> On Wed, Mar 06, 2013 at 10:42:31AM -0500, Mimi Zohar wrote:
> 
> [..]
> > > Mimi, so you like this idea better than the other idea of keeping two 
> > > policy chains and running more restrictive rule while resolving flag
> > > conflicts between two rules?
> > > 
> > > I have written some patches to maintain two rule chains and running
> > > more restrictive rule. I can change it though.
> > 
> > Both options overload the file signature with additional meaning to
> > indicate these files need 'special' handling (eg. memory locking).
> 
> I think memory locking is not part of integrity as such. If user space
> is partially signed, then we need to lock files into memory. But if
> whole of the user space is signed, we might get away without locking
> everything in memory.
> 
> So I think we should not build the notion of memory locking into IMA.
> Caller knows whether to lock things into memory or not. IMA should
> just facilitate integrity verification (before locking and after
> locking) and it is left to the caller to decide when is the right
> time to do verification.

Great!  So define a hook, in the appropriate place, and IMA will
appraise the file based on policy.

> >  If
> > we merge rules, then all files with a signature would be processed with
> > this special handling; in the other case, the special handling is
> > limited to a particular policy.
> > 
> > The basic premise, that all files with a valid signature need this
> > special handling, is flawed.  If some other mechanism would be used to
> > identify these files requiring 'special' handling, then merging of
> > policy rules would be a non-issue.  We wouldn't even need to merge
> > rules.
> 
> I am not sure what does "special handling" mean here, but then we are
> hardcoding things in file's extended attributes. 
> 
> In this case kernel needs to decide how to handle file. (possibly based
> on a config option). Again going back to memlock example, IMA or file
> attribute should not dictate whether file should be memlocked or not.
> Whether file's appraisal result should be cached or not. Whether
> "measurement" of cache results should be cached or not. This is much
> worse hardcoding to me. 
> 
> IMHO, IMA can provide simple callable functions (like verify_signature())
> which does not assume too much and let caller figure out the thigs
> around it. This is much more simple.
> 
> > 
> > My preference would be to define some other mechanism to identify these
> > files. (Agreed, using the 'security.ima' xattr, is a kludge.)
> 
> IMO, it should not a file's attribtue. Caller knows how to handle it.
> IMA should just verify the integrity. Caller can choose to lock or not
> lock the file in memory depending on its needs and environment it is
> operating in. And I don't think this kind of information should be
> file specific.
> 
> >  With EVM
> > protection of LSM labels, you might consider defining a policy based on
> > LSM labels.  Otherwise, consider defining and using a different extended
> > attribute, or any other file metadata, for this purpose.  Once some
> > method for identifying these files, other than file signature, is
> > defined, we could then add a new policy option (eg. memlock) or even
> > action primitive (eg. appraise_memlock).
> > 
> > As the 'special' handling probably doesn't scale very well, we're better
> > off not requiring it for all signed files.  Hopefully, the affects of
> > not having this special privilege, will be limited to only what has been
> > discussed (eg. kdump).  Even this decision, will require more than my
> > agreement.
> 
> IMHO, defining directly callable IMA hooks is much simpler, and much
> more maintainable and much more scalable. Atleast we should discuss it
> again why it it is not right thing to do. Why it is right thing to
> do for security/keys or security/crypto to export callable functions
> and then let the caller decide what to do with it. But it is not right for
> security/integrity/* or security/integrity/ima*. I just don't get it.

The purpose of both /crypto and /keys is to provide a callable service
to other parts of the kernel (and expose an interface to userspace).
The original purpose of IMA was to provide a hardware rooted trusted
list of runtime measurements.  With the upstreaming of IMA-appraisal
patches, IMA now enforces file integrity as well.

Adding an IMA call to directly appraise the integrity of a file, rather
than adding a hook, prevents other integrity users from being able to
define a rule at that point.  I don't have a problem with exposing an
integrity interface, assuming there is a real need.

Mimi

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