.. role:: since ===================== Polkit access control ===================== Libvirt's client `access control framework `__ allows administrators to setup fine grained permission rules across client users, managed objects and API operations. This allows client connections to be locked down to a minimal set of privileges. The polkit driver provides a simple implementation of the access control framework. .. contents:: Introduction ------------ A default install of libvirt will typically use `polkit `__ to authenticate the initial user connection to libvirtd. This is a very coarse grained check though, either allowing full read-write access to all APIs, or just read-only access. The polkit access control driver in libvirt builds on this capability to allow for fine grained control over the operations a user may perform on an object. Permission names ---------------- The libvirt `object names and permission names `__ are mapped onto polkit action names using the simple pattern: :: org.libvirt.api.$object.$permission The only caveat is that any underscore characters in the object or permission names are converted to hyphens. So, for example, the ``search_storage_vols`` permission on the ``storage_pool`` object maps to the polkit action: :: org.libvirt.api.storage-pool.search-storage-vols The default policy for any permission which corresponds to a "read only" operation, is to allow access. All other permissions default to deny access. Object identity attributes -------------------------- To allow polkit authorization rules to be written to match against individual object instances, libvirt provides a number of authorization detail attributes when performing a permission check. The set of attributes varies according to the type of object being checked virConnectPtr ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ============== ===================================== Attribute Description ============== ===================================== connect_driver Name of the libvirt connection driver ============== ===================================== virDomainPtr ~~~~~~~~~~~~ ============== ============================================ Attribute Description ============== ============================================ connect_driver Name of the libvirt connection driver domain_name Name of the domain, unique to the local host domain_uuid UUID of the domain, globally unique ============== ============================================ virInterfacePtr ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ +-------------------+---------------------------------------------------------+ | Attribute | Description | +===================+=========================================================+ | connect_driver | Name of the libvirt connection driver | +-------------------+---------------------------------------------------------+ | interface_name | Name of the network interface, unique to the local host | +-------------------+---------------------------------------------------------+ | interface_macaddr | MAC address of the network interface, not unique | +-------------------+---------------------------------------------------------+ virNetworkPtr ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ============== ============================================= Attribute Description ============== ============================================= connect_driver Name of the libvirt connection driver network_name Name of the network, unique to the local host network_uuid UUID of the network, globally unique ============== ============================================= virNodeDevicePtr ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ================ ================================================= Attribute Description ================ ================================================= connect_driver Name of the libvirt connection driver node_device_name Name of the node device, unique to the local host ================ ================================================= virNWFilterPtr ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ============== ==================================================== Attribute Description ============== ==================================================== connect_driver Name of the libvirt connection driver nwfilter_name Name of the network filter, unique to the local host nwfilter_uuid UUID of the network filter, globally unique ============== ==================================================== virSecretPtr ~~~~~~~~~~~~ =================== =========================================== Attribute Description =================== =========================================== connect_driver Name of the libvirt connection driver secret_uuid UUID of the secret, globally unique secret_usage_volume Name of the associated volume, if any secret_usage_ceph Name of the associated Ceph server, if any secret_usage_target Name of the associated iSCSI target, if any secret_usage_name Name of the associated TLS secret, if any =================== =========================================== virStoragePoolPtr ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ============== ================================================== Attribute Description ============== ================================================== connect_driver Name of the libvirt connection driver pool_name Name of the storage pool, unique to the local host pool_uuid UUID of the storage pool, globally unique ============== ================================================== virStorageVolPtr ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ============== ================================================== Attribute Description ============== ================================================== connect_driver Name of the libvirt connection driver pool_name Name of the storage pool, unique to the local host pool_uuid UUID of the storage pool, globally unique vol_name Name of the storage volume, unique to the pool vol_key Key of the storage volume, globally unique ============== ================================================== Hypervisor Driver connect_driver -------------------------------- The ``connect_driver`` parameter describes the client's `remote Connection Driver `__ name based on the `URI `__ used for the connection. :since:`Since 4.1.0`, when calling an API outside the scope of the primary connection driver, the primary driver will attempt to open a secondary connection to the specific API driver in order to process the API. For example, when hypervisor domain processing needs to make an API call within the storage driver or the network filter driver an attempt to open a connection to the "storage" or "nwfilter" driver will be made. Similarly, a "storage" primary connection may need to create a connection to the "secret" driver in order to process secrets for the API. If successful, then calls to those API's will occur in the ``connect_driver`` context of the secondary connection driver rather than in the context of the primary driver. This affects the ``connect_driver`` returned from rule generation from the ``action.loookup`` function. The following table provides a list of the various connection drivers and the ``connect_driver`` name used by each regardless of primary or secondary connection. The access denied error message from libvirt will list the connection driver by name that denied the access. Connection Driver Name ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ================= ======================= Connection Driver ``connect_driver`` name ================= ======================= bhyve bhyve esx ESX hyperv Hyper-V interface interface xen Xen lxc LXC network network nodedev nodedev nwfilter NWFilter openvz OPENVZ qemu QEMU secret secret storage storage vbox VBOX vmware VMWARE vz vz ================= ======================= User identity attributes ------------------------ At this point in time, the only attribute provided by libvirt to identify the user invoking the operation is the PID of the client program. This means that the polkit access control driver is only useful if connections to libvirt are restricted to its UNIX domain socket. If connections are being made to a TCP socket, no identifying information is available and access will be denied. Also note that if the client is connecting via an SSH tunnel, it is the local SSH user that will be identified. In future versions, it is expected that more information about the client user will be provided, including the SASL / Kerberos username and/or x509 distinguished name obtained from the authentication provider in use. Writing access control policies ------------------------------- If using versions of polkit prior to 0.106 then it is only possible to validate (user, permission) pairs via the ``.pkla`` files. Fully validation of the (user, permission, object) triple requires the new JavaScript ``.rules`` support that was introduced in version 0.106. The latter is what will be described here. Libvirt does not ship any rules files by default. It merely provides a definition of the default behaviour for each action (permission). As noted earlier, permissions which correspond to read-only operations in libvirt will be allowed to all users by default; everything else is denied by default. Defining custom rules requires creation of a file in the ``/etc/polkit-1/rules.d`` directory with a name chosen by the administrator (``100-libvirt-acl.rules`` would be a reasonable choice). See the ``polkit(8)`` manual page for a description of how to write these files in general. The key idea is to create a file containing something like :: polkit.addRule(function(action, subject) { ....logic to check 'action' and 'subject'... }); In this code snippet above, the ``action`` object instance will represent the libvirt permission being checked along with identifying attributes for the object it is being applied to. The ``subject`` meanwhile will identify the libvirt client app (with the caveat above about it only dealing with local clients connected via the UNIX socket). On the ``action`` object, the permission name is accessible via the ``id`` attribute, while the object identifying attributes are exposed via the ``lookup`` method. See `source code `__ for a more complex example. Example: restricting ability to connect to drivers ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Consider a local user ``berrange`` who has been granted permission to connect to libvirt in full read-write mode. The goal is to only allow them to use the ``QEMU`` driver and not the Xen or LXC drivers which are also available in libvirtd. To achieve this we need to write a rule which checks whether the ``connect_driver`` attribute is ``QEMU``, and match on an action name of ``org.libvirt.api.connect.getattr``. Using the javascript rules format, this ends up written as :: polkit.addRule(function(action, subject) { if (action.id == "org.libvirt.api.connect.getattr" && subject.user == "berrange") { if (action.lookup("connect_driver") == 'QEMU') { return polkit.Result.YES; } else { return polkit.Result.NO; } } }); Example: restricting access to a single domain ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Consider a local user ``berrange`` who has been granted permission to connect to libvirt in full read-write mode. The goal is to only allow them to see the domain called ``demo`` on the LXC driver. To achieve this we need to write a rule which checks whether the ``connect_driver`` attribute is ``LXC`` and the ``domain_name`` attribute is ``demo``, and match on an action name of ``org.libvirt.api.domain.getattr``. Using the javascript rules format, this ends up written as :: polkit.addRule(function(action, subject) { if (action.id == "org.libvirt.api.domain.getattr" && subject.user == "berrange") { if (action.lookup("connect_driver") == 'LXC' && action.lookup("domain_name") == 'demo') { return polkit.Result.YES; } else { return polkit.Result.NO; } } });