pandora_box 0.0.5

Pandora's Box: A helper for SydBox, a ptrace & seccomp based sandbox to make sandboxing practical
Documentation

Syd's Box

SydBox is a ptrace & seccomp based sandbox for modern Linux machines to sandbox unwanted process access to filesystem and network resources.

SydBox uses autotools. To build, simply do ./configure, make and make install.

To use SydBox you need a recent Linux kernel, preferably 3.5 or newer which has secure computing mode facility. Make sure you build SydBox with --enable-seccomp given to ./configure. SydBox works fine without it but it is going to be noticably slower and less secure. See the SydBox manual page on more information about secure computing mode protections.

NOTE: Secure computing mode only works on i386 and x86_64 architectures.

In addition, it is advised that you enable the kernel option CONFIG_CROSS_MEMORY_ATTACH=y.

NOTE: Pandora is in its early stages of development. To be able to use pandora you should clone SydBox from git and build SydBox from the inspect branch.

Browse at https://git.exherbo.org/sydbox-1.git/?h=inspect

You can check the build options using sydbox --version:

$ sydbox --version
sydbox-1.1.0-pandora-0.0.3-1-gc96f237 (pinktrace-0.9.5 git:v0.9.5-1-ge6ac27f)
Options: dump:yes seccomp:yes ipv6:yes netlink:yes
  • dump:yes with the correct format expected by Pandora is on the inspect branch only.
  • seccomp:yes indicates --enable-seccomp was passed on build.
  • ipv6:yes IPv6 Network Sandboxing is enabled.

SydBox requires Pink's Tracing Library

Pandora

Pandora's Box: A helper for SydBox, a ptrace & seccomp based sandbox to make sandboxing practical. This makes it easy for the end user to use secure computing for practical purposes.

Simple Example:

Step 1: Inspect and gather data about the given process.

In this case, we're going to try with https://www.mozilla.org/de/firefox/new/.

$ pandora profile firefox

Browse using firefox for a while, let pandora gather data. The browser is running under a tracer so it'll run noticably slower.

  • use --bin /path/to/sydbox, if sydbox is not in PATH
  • use --output firefox.syd-1 to specify an alternative output path for profile.
$ $EDITOR out.syd-1

Inspect what the browser has been doing. Enable, disable additional options or turn paths into wildcards such as /home/*** to allow home and everything beyond /home the usual glob characters, ?, * are supported.

Check SydBox manual page to learn more on how PATTERN MATCHING works.

Enable, disable additional network addresses unless you're using a SOCKS5 proxy which does remote DNS lookups, e.g:

whitelist/network/connect+inet:127.0.0.1@9050

for Tor.

Check SydBox manual page to learn more on how ADDRESS MATCHING works.

$ pandora box -c out.syd-1 firefox

  • Run the browser under secure computing with full protection.

  • Check SydBox manual page for a list of system call protections.

  • Check the console for possible access violations over time.

  • Edit the profile file as necessary and update restrictions.

For instance if you see an access violation such as

sydbox: 8< -- Access Violation! --
sydbox: connect(-1, unix:/run/user/1000/pulse/native)
sydbox: proc: AudioIPC Server[754336] (parent:0)
sydbox: cwd: `/home/alip/src/exherbo/sydbox-1'
sydbox: cmdline: `/usr/lib/firefox/firefox '
sydbox: >8 --
sydbox: 8< -- Access Violation! --
sydbox: connect(-1, unix:/var/run/pulse/native)
sydbox: proc: AudioIPC Server[754336] (parent:0)
sydbox: cwd: `/home/alip/src/exherbo/sydbox-1'
sydbox: cmdline: `/usr/lib/firefox/firefox '
sydbox: >8 --

This sounds like you're trying to play some audio on your browser. In this case, you should add a whitelist to your profile .syd-1 file and restart your browser under this new profile.

whitelist/connect/network+unix:/run/pulse/native
whitelist/connect/network+unix:/var/run/pulse/native

Note, sometimes you may have to add a symbolic link rather than the file it is pointing to, or vice versa, or both.

Last but not least,

Share your profile with other people and help others use secure computing!

Documentation

Read the fine manual of SydBox and SydFmt.

Blog Posts