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Practice questions for Certified Kubernetes Security Specialist (CKS) exam

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CKS Simulator Kubernetes 1.25

https://killer.sh

Pre Setup

Once you've gained access to your terminal it might be wise to spend ~1 minute to setup your environment. You could set these:

alias k=kubectl                         # will already be pre-configured

export do="--dry-run=client -o yaml"    # k create deploy nginx --image=nginx $do

export now="--force --grace-period 0"   # k delete pod x $now

Vim The following settings will already be configured in your real exam environment in ~/.vimrc. But it can never hurt to be able to type these down:

set tabstop=2
set expandtab
set shiftwidth=2

More setup suggestions are in the tips section.

Question 1 | Contexts

Task weight: 1%

You have access to multiple clusters from your main terminal through kubectl contexts. Write all context names into /opt/course/1/contexts, one per line.

From the kubeconfig extract the certificate of user restricted@infra-prod and write it decoded to /opt/course/1/cert.

Answer:

Maybe the fastest way is just to run:

k config get-contexts # copy by hand

k config get-contexts -o name > /opt/course/1/contexts

Or using jsonpath:

k config view -o jsonpath="{.contexts[*].name}"
k config view -o jsonpath="{.contexts[*].name}" | tr " " "\n" # new lines
k config view -o jsonpath="{.contexts[*].name}" | tr " " "\n" > /opt/course/1/contexts

The content could then look like:

#/opt/course/1/contexts
gianna@infra-prod
infra-prod
restricted@infra-prod
workload-prod
workload-stage

For the certificate we could just run

k config view --raw

And copy it manually. Or we do:

k config view --raw -ojsonpath="{.users[2].user.client-certificate-data}" | base64 -d > /opt/course/1/cert

Or even:

k config view --raw -ojsonpath="{.users[?(.name == 'restricted@infra-prod')].user.client-certificate-data}" | base64 -d > /opt/course/1/cert
# /opt/course/1/cert
-----BEGIN CERTIFICATE-----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-----END CERTIFICATE-----

Question 2 | Runtime Security with Falco

Task weight: 4%

Use context: kubectl config use-context workload-prod

Falco is installed with default configuration on node cluster1-node1. Connect using ssh cluster1-node1. Use it to:

Find a Pod running image nginx which creates unwanted package management processes inside its container. Find a Pod running image httpd which modifies /etc/passwd. Save the Falco logs for case 1 under /opt/course/2/falco.log in format:

time-with-nanosconds,container-id,container-name,user-name

No other information should be in any line. Collect the logs for at least 30 seconds.

Afterwards remove the threads (both 1 and 2) by scaling the replicas of the Deployments that control the offending Pods down to 0.

Answer: Falco, the open-source cloud-native runtime security project, is the de facto Kubernetes threat detection engine.

NOTE: Other tools you might have to be familar with are sysdig or tracee

Use Falco as service

First we can investigate Falco config a little:

âžś ssh cluster1-node1

âžś root@cluster1-node1:~# service falco status
â—Ź falco.service - LSB: Falco syscall activity monitoring agent
   Loaded: loaded (/etc/init.d/falco; generated)
   Active: active (running) since Sat 2020-10-10 06:36:15 UTC; 2h 1min ago
...

âžś root@cluster1-node1:~# cd /etc/falco

âžś root@cluster1-node1:/etc/falco# ls


falco.yaml  falco_rules.local.yaml  falco_rules.yaml  k8s_audit_rules.yaml  rules.available  rules.d

This is the default configuration, if we look into falco.yaml we can see:

# /etc/falco/falco.yaml

...
# Where security notifications should go.
# Multiple outputs can be enabled.

syslog_output:
  enabled: true
...

This means that Falco is writing into syslog, hence we can do:

âžś root@cluster1-node1:~# cat /var/log/syslog | grep falco
Sep 15 08:44:04 ubuntu2004 falco: Falco version 0.29.1 (driver version 17f5df52a7d9ed6bb12d3b1768460def8439936d)
Sep 15 08:44:04 ubuntu2004 falco: Falco initialized with configuration file /etc/falco/falco.yaml
Sep 15 08:44:04 ubuntu2004 falco: Loading rules from file /etc/falco/falco_rules.yaml:
...

Yep, quite some action going on in there. Let's investigate the first offending Pod:

âžś root@cluster1-node1:~# cat /var/log/syslog | grep falco | grep nginx | grep process
Sep 16 06:23:47 ubuntu2004 falco: 06:23:47.376241377: Error Package management process launched in container (user=root user_loginuid=-1 command=apk container_id=7a5ea6a080d1 container_name=nginx image=docker.io/library/nginx:1.19.2-alpine)
...

âžś root@cluster1-node1:~# crictl ps -id 7a5ea6a080d1
CONTAINER ID        IMAGE              NAME        ...         POD ID
7a5ea6a080d1b       6f715d38cfe0e      nginx       ...         7a864406b9794

root@cluster1-node1:~# crictl pods -id 7a864406b9794
POD ID              ...          NAME                             NAMESPACE        ...
7a864406b9794       ...          webapi-6cfddcd6f4-ftxg4          team-blue        ...

First Pod is webapi-6cfddcd6f4-ftxg4 in Namespace team-blue.

âžś root@cluster1-node1:~# cat /var/log/syslog | grep falco | grep httpd | grep passwd
Sep 16 06:23:48 ubuntu2004 falco: 06:23:48.830962378: Error File below /etc opened for writing (user=root user_loginuid=-1 command=sed -i $d /etc/passwd parent=sh pcmdline=sh -c echo hacker >> /etc/passwd; sed -i '$d' /etc/passwd; true file=/etc/passwdngFmAl program=sed gparent=<NA> ggparent=<NA> gggparent=<NA> container_id=b1339d5cc2de image=docker.io/library/httpd)

âžś root@cluster1-node1:~# crictl ps -id b1339d5cc2de
CONTAINER ID        IMAGE              NAME        ...         POD ID
b1339d5cc2dee       f6b40f9f8ad71      httpd       ...         595af943c3245

root@cluster1-node1:~# crictl pods -id 595af943c3245
POD ID              ...          NAME                             NAMESPACE          ...
595af943c3245       ...          rating-service-68cbdf7b7-v2p6g   team-purple        ...

Second Pod is rating-service-68cbdf7b7-v2p6g in Namespace team-purple.

Eliminate offending Pods

The logs from before should allow us to find and "eliminate" the offending Pods:

âžś k get pod -A | grep webapi
team-blue              webapi-6cfddcd6f4-ftxg4                      1/1     Running 

âžś k -n team-blue scale deploy webapi --replicas 0
deployment.apps/webapi scaled

âžś k get pod -A | grep rating-service
team-purple            rating-service-68cbdf7b7-v2p6g               1/1     Running

âžś k -n team-purple scale deploy rating-service --replicas 0
deployment.apps/rating-service scaled

Use Falco from command line

We can also use Falco directly from command line, but only if the service is disabled:

âžś root@cluster1-node1:~# service falco stop

âžś root@cluster1-node1:~# falco
Thu Sep 16 06:33:11 2021: Falco version 0.29.1 (driver version 17f5df52a7d9ed6bb12d3b1768460def8439936d)
Thu Sep 16 06:33:11 2021: Falco initialized with configuration file /etc/falco/falco.yaml
Thu Sep 16 06:33:11 2021: Loading rules from file /etc/falco/falco_rules.yaml:
Thu Sep 16 06:33:11 2021: Loading rules from file /etc/falco/falco_rules.local.yaml:
Thu Sep 16 06:33:11 2021: Loading rules from file /etc/falco/k8s_audit_rules.yaml:
Thu Sep 16 06:33:12 2021: Starting internal webserver, listening on port 8765
06:33:17.382603204: Error Package management process launched in container (user=root user_loginuid=-1 command=apk container_id=7a5ea6a080d1 container_name=nginx image=docker.io/library/nginx:1.19.2-alpine)
...

We can see that rule files are loaded and logs printed afterwards.

Create logs in correct format

The task requires us to store logs for "unwanted package management processes" in format time,container-id,container-name,user-name. The output from falco shows entries for "Error Package management process launched" in a default format. Let's find the proper file that contains the rule and change it:

âžś root@cluster1-node1:~# cd /etc/falco/

âžś root@cluster1-node1:/etc/falco# grep -r "Package management process launched" .
./falco_rules.yaml:    Package management process launched in container (user=%user.name user_loginuid=%user.loginuid

âžś root@cluster1-node1:/etc/falco# cp falco_rules.yaml falco_rules.yaml_ori

âžś root@cluster1-node1:/etc/falco# vim falco_rules.yaml

Find the rule which looks like this:

# Container is supposed to be immutable. Package management should be done in building the image.
- rule: Launch Package Management Process in Container
  desc: Package management process ran inside container
  condition: >
    spawned_process
    and container
    and user.name != "_apt"
    and package_mgmt_procs
    and not package_mgmt_ancestor_procs
    and not user_known_package_manager_in_container
  output: >
    Package management process launched in container (user=%user.name user_loginuid=%user.loginuid
    command=%proc.cmdline container_id=%container.id container_name=%container.name image=%container.image.repository:%container.image.tag)
  priority: ERROR
  tags: [process, mitre_persistence]
  

Should be changed into the required format:

# Container is supposed to be immutable. Package management should be done in building the image.
- rule: Launch Package Management Process in Container
  desc: Package management process ran inside container
  condition: >
    spawned_process
    and container
    and user.name != "_apt"
    and package_mgmt_procs
    and not package_mgmt_ancestor_procs
    and not user_known_package_manager_in_container
  output: >
    Package management process launched in container %evt.time,%container.id,%container.name,%user.name
  priority: ERROR
  tags: [process, mitre_persistence]

For all available fields we can check https://falco.org/docs/rules/supported-fields, which should be allowed to open during the exam.

Next we check the logs in our adjusted format:

âžś root@cluster1-node1:/etc/falco# falco | grep "Package management"

06:38:28.077150666: Error Package management process launched in container 06:38:28.077150666,090aad374a0a,nginx,root
06:38:33.058263010: Error Package management process launched in container 06:38:33.058263010,090aad374a0a,nginx,root
06:38:38.068693625: Error Package management process launched in container 06:38:38.068693625,090aad374a0a,nginx,root
06:38:43.066159360: Error Package management process launched in container 06:38:43.066159360,090aad374a0a,nginx,root
06:38:48.059792139: Error Package management process launched in container 06:38:48.059792139,090aad374a0a,nginx,root
06:38:53.063328933: Error Package management process launched in container 06:38:53.063328933,090aad374a0a,nginx,root

This looks much better. Copy&paste the output into file /opt/course/2/falco.log on your main terminal. The content should be cleaned like this:

# /opt/course/2/falco.log
06:38:28.077150666,090aad374a0a,nginx,root
06:38:33.058263010,090aad374a0a,nginx,root
06:38:38.068693625,090aad374a0a,nginx,root
06:38:43.066159360,090aad374a0a,nginx,root
06:38:48.059792139,090aad374a0a,nginx,root
06:38:53.063328933,090aad374a0a,nginx,root
06:38:58.070912841,090aad374a0a,nginx,root
06:39:03.069592140,090aad374a0a,nginx,root
06:39:08.064805371,090aad374a0a,nginx,root
06:39:13.078109098,090aad374a0a,nginx,root
06:39:18.065077287,090aad374a0a,nginx,root
06:39:23.061012151,090aad374a0a,nginx,root

For a few entries it should be fast to just clean it up manually. If there are larger amounts of entries we could do:

cat /opt/course/2/falco.log.dirty | cut -d" " -f 9 > /opt/course/2/falco.log

The tool cut will split input into fields using space as the delimiter (-d""). We then only select the 9th field using -f 9.

Local falco rules

There is also a file /etc/falco/falco_rules.local.yaml in which we can override existing default rules. This is a much cleaner solution for production. Choose the faster way for you in the exam if nothing is specified in the task.

Question 3 | Apiserver Security

Task weight: 3%

Use context: kubectl config use-context workload-prod

You received a list from the DevSecOps team which performed a security investigation of the k8s cluster1 (workload-prod). The list states the following about the apiserver setup:

  • Accessible through a NodePort Service

Change the apiserver setup so that:

  • Only accessible through a ClusterIP Service

Answer:

In order to modify the parameters for the apiserver, we first ssh into the master node and check which parameters the apiserver process is running with:

âžś ssh cluster1-controlplane1

âžś root@cluster1-controlplane1:~# ps aux | grep kube-apiserver
root     13534  8.6 18.1 1099208 370684 ?      Ssl  19:55   8:40 kube-apiserver --advertise-address=192.168.100.11 --allow-privileged=true --anonymous-auth=true --authorization-mode=Node,RBAC --client-ca-file=/etc/kubernetes/pki/ca.crt --enable-admission-plugins=NodeRestriction --enable-bootstrap-token-auth=true --etcd-cafile=/etc/kubernetes/pki/etcd/ca.crt --etcd-certfile=/etc/kubernetes/pki/apiserver-etcd-client.crt --etcd-keyfile=/etc/kubernetes/pki/apiserver-etcd-client.key --etcd-servers=https://127.0.0.1:2379 --kubelet-client-certificate=/etc/kubernetes/pki/apiserver-kubelet-client.crt --kubelet-client-key=/etc/kubernetes/pki/apiserver-kubelet-client.key --kubelet-preferred-address-types=InternalIP,ExternalIP,Hostname --kubernetes-service-node-port=31000 --proxy-client-cert-file=/etc/kubernetes/pki/front-proxy-client.crt --proxy-client-key-
...

We may notice the following argument:

--kubernetes-service-node-port=31000

We can also check the Service and see its of type NodePort:

âžś root@cluster1-controlplane1:~# kubectl get svc
NAME         TYPE       CLUSTER-IP   EXTERNAL-IP   PORT(S)         AGE
kubernetes   NodePort   10.96.0.1    <none>        443:31000/TCP   5d2h

The apiserver runs as a static Pod, so we can edit the manifest. But before we do this we also create a copy in case we mess things up:

âžś root@cluster1-controlplane1:~# cp /etc/kubernetes/manifests/kube-apiserver.yaml ~/3_kube-apiserver.yaml

âžś root@cluster1-controlplane1:~# vim /etc/kubernetes/manifests/kube-apiserver.yaml

We should remove the unsecure settings:

# /etc/kubernetes/manifests/kube-apiserver.yaml
apiVersion: v1
kind: Pod
metadata:
  annotations:
    kubeadm.kubernetes.io/kube-apiserver.advertise-address.endpoint: 192.168.100.11:6443
  creationTimestamp: null
  labels:
    component: kube-apiserver
    tier: control-plane
  name: kube-apiserver
  namespace: kube-system
spec:
  containers:
  - command:
    - kube-apiserver
    - --advertise-address=192.168.100.11
    - --allow-privileged=true
    - --authorization-mode=Node,RBAC
    - --client-ca-file=/etc/kubernetes/pki/ca.crt
    - --enable-admission-plugins=NodeRestriction
    - --enable-bootstrap-token-auth=true
    - --etcd-cafile=/etc/kubernetes/pki/etcd/ca.crt
    - --etcd-certfile=/etc/kubernetes/pki/apiserver-etcd-client.crt
    - --etcd-keyfile=/etc/kubernetes/pki/apiserver-etcd-client.key
    - --etcd-servers=https://127.0.0.1:2379
    - --kubelet-client-certificate=/etc/kubernetes/pki/apiserver-kubelet-client.crt
    - --kubelet-client-key=/etc/kubernetes/pki/apiserver-kubelet-client.key
    - --kubelet-preferred-address-types=InternalIP,ExternalIP,Hostname
#    - --kubernetes-service-node-port=31000   # delete or set to 0
    - --proxy-client-cert-file=/etc/kubernetes/pki/front-proxy-client.crt
    - --proxy-client-key-file=/etc/kubernetes/pki/front-proxy-client.key
...

Once the changes are made, give the apiserver some time to start up again. Check the apiserver's Pod status and the process parameters:

âžś root@cluster1-controlplane1:~# kubectl -n kube-system get pod | grep apiserver
kube-apiserver-cluster1-controlplane1            1/1     Running        0          38s

âžś root@cluster1-controlplane1:~# ps aux | grep kube-apiserver | grep node-port
The apiserver got restarted without the unsecure settings. However, the Service kubernetes will still be of type NodePort:

âžś root@cluster1-controlplane1:~# kubectl get svc
NAME         TYPE       CLUSTER-IP   EXTERNAL-IP   PORT(S)         AGE
kubernetes   NodePort   10.96.0.1    <none>        443:31000/TCP   5d3h
We need to delete the Service for the changes to take effect:

âžś root@cluster1-controlplane1:~# kubectl delete svc kubernetes
service "kubernetes" deleted

After a few seconds:

âžś root@cluster1-controlplane1:~# kubectl get svc
NAME         TYPE        CLUSTER-IP   EXTERNAL-IP   PORT(S)   AGE
kubernetes   ClusterIP   10.96.0.1    <none>        443/TCP   6s

This should satisfy the DevSecOps team.

Question 4 | Pod Security Standard

Task weight: 8%

Use context: kubectl config use-context workload-prod

There is Deployment container-host-hacker in Namespace team-red which mounts /run/containerd as a hostPath volume on the Node where its running. This means that the Pod can access various data about other containers running on the same Node.

To prevent this configure Namespace team-red to enforce the baseline Pod Security Standard. Once completed, delete the Pod of the Deployment mentioned above.

Check the ReplicaSet events and write the event/log lines containing the reason why the Pod isn't recreated into /opt/course/4/logs.

Answer:

Making Namespaces use Pod Security Standards works via labels. We can simply edit it:

k edit ns team-red

Now we configure the requested label:

# kubectl edit namespace team-red
apiVersion: v1
kind: Namespace
metadata:
  labels:
    kubernetes.io/metadata.name: team-red
    pod-security.kubernetes.io/enforce: baseline # add
  name: team-red
...

This should already be enough for the default Pod Security Admission Controller to pick up on that change. Let's test it and delete the Pod to see if it'll be recreated or fails, it should fail!

âžś k -n team-red get pod
NAME                                    READY   STATUS    RESTARTS   AGE
container-host-hacker-dbf989777-wm8fc   1/1     Running   0          115s

âžś k -n team-red delete pod container-host-hacker-dbf989777-wm8fc 
pod "container-host-hacker-dbf989777-wm8fc" deleted

âžś k -n team-red get pod
No resources found in team-red namespace.

Usually the ReplicaSet of a Deployment would recreate the Pod if deleted, here we see this doesn't happen. Let's check why:

âžś k -n team-red get rs
NAME                              DESIRED   CURRENT   READY   AGE
container-host-hacker-dbf989777   1         0         0       5m25s

âžś k -n team-red describe rs container-host-hacker-dbf989777
Name:           container-host-hacker-dbf989777
Namespace:      team-red
...
Events:
  Type     Reason            Age                   From                   Message
  ----     ------            ----                  ----                   -------
...
  Warning  FailedCreate      2m41s                 replicaset-controller  Error creating: pods "container-host-hacker-dbf989777-bjwgv" is forbidden: violates PodSecurity "baseline:latest": hostPath volumes (volume "containerdata")
  Warning  FailedCreate      2m2s (x9 over 2m40s)  replicaset-controller  (combined from similar events): Error creating: pods "container-host-hacker-dbf989777-kjfpn" is forbidden: violates PodSecurity "baseline:latest": hostPath volumes (volume "containerdata")

There we go! Finally we write the reason into the requested file so that Mr Scoring will be happy too!

# /opt/course/4/logs
Warning  FailedCreate      2m2s (x9 over 2m40s)  replicaset-controller  (combined from similar events): Error creating: pods "container-host-hacker-dbf989777-kjfpn" is forbidden: violates PodSecurity "baseline:latest": hostPath volumes (volume "containerdata")
Pod Security Standards can give a great base level of security! But when one finds themselves wanting to deeper adjust the levels like baseline or restricted... this isn't possible and 3rd party solutions like OPA could be looked at.

Question 5 | CIS Benchmark

Task weight: 3%

Use context: kubectl config use-context infra-prod

You're ask to evaluate specific settings of cluster2 against the CIS Benchmark recommendations. Use the tool kube-bench which is already installed on the nodes.

Connect using ssh cluster2-controlplane1 and ssh cluster2-node1.

On the master node ensure (correct if necessary) that the CIS recommendations are set for:

  • The --profiling argument of the kube-controller-manager

  • The ownership of directory /var/lib/etcd

On the worker node ensure (correct if necessary) that the CIS recommendations are set for:

  • The permissions of the kubelet configuration /var/lib/kubelet/config.yaml
  • The --client-ca-file argument of the kubelet

Answer:

Number 1

First we ssh into the master node run kube-bench against the master components:

âžś ssh cluster2-controlplane1

âžś root@cluster2-controlplane1:~# kube-bench run --targets=master
...
== Summary ==
41 checks PASS
13 checks FAIL
11 checks WARN
0 checks INFO

We see some passes, fails and warnings. Let's check the required task (1) of the controller manager:

âžś root@cluster2-controlplane1:~# kube-bench run --targets=master | grep kube-controller -A 3
1.3.1 Edit the Controller Manager pod specification file /etc/kubernetes/manifests/kube-controller-manager.yaml
on the master node and set the --terminated-pod-gc-threshold to an appropriate threshold,
for example:
--terminated-pod-gc-threshold=10
--
1.3.2 Edit the Controller Manager pod specification file /etc/kubernetes/manifests/kube-controller-manager.yaml
on the master node and set the below parameter.
--profiling=false

1.3.6 Edit the Controller Manager pod specification file /etc/kubernetes/manifests/kube-controller-manager.yaml
on the master node and set the --feature-gates parameter to include RotateKubeletServerCertificate=true.
--feature-gates=RotateKubeletServerCertificate=true

There we see 1.3.2 which suggests to set --profiling=false, so we obey:

âžś root@cluster2-controlplane1:~# vim /etc/kubernetes/manifests/kube-controller-manager.yaml

Edit the corresponding line:

# /etc/kubernetes/manifests/kube-controller-manager.yaml
apiVersion: v1
kind: Pod
metadata:
  creationTimestamp: null
  labels:
    component: kube-controller-manager
    tier: control-plane
  name: kube-controller-manager
  namespace: kube-system
spec:
  containers:
  - command:
    - kube-controller-manager
    - --allocate-node-cidrs=true
    - --authentication-kubeconfig=/etc/kubernetes/controller-manager.conf
    - --authorization-kubeconfig=/etc/kubernetes/controller-manager.conf
    - --bind-address=127.0.0.1
    - --client-ca-file=/etc/kubernetes/pki/ca.crt
    - --cluster-cidr=10.244.0.0/16
    - --cluster-name=kubernetes
    - --cluster-signing-cert-file=/etc/kubernetes/pki/ca.crt
    - --cluster-signing-key-file=/etc/kubernetes/pki/ca.key
    - --controllers=*,bootstrapsigner,tokencleaner
    - --kubeconfig=/etc/kubernetes/controller-manager.conf
    - --leader-elect=true
    - --node-cidr-mask-size=24
    - --port=0
    - --requestheader-client-ca-file=/etc/kubernetes/pki/front-proxy-ca.crt
    - --root-ca-file=/etc/kubernetes/pki/ca.crt
    - --service-account-private-key-file=/etc/kubernetes/pki/sa.key
    - --service-cluster-ip-range=10.96.0.0/12
    - --use-service-account-credentials=true
    - --profiling=false            # add
...

We wait for the Pod to restart, then run kube-bench again to check if the problem was solved:

âžś root@cluster2-controlplane1:~# kube-bench run --targets=master | grep kube-controller -A 3
1.3.1 Edit the Controller Manager pod specification file /etc/kubernetes/manifests/kube-controller-manager.yaml
on the master node and set the --terminated-pod-gc-threshold to an appropriate threshold,
for example:
--terminated-pod-gc-threshold=10
--
1.3.6 Edit the Controller Manager pod specification file /etc/kubernetes/manifests/kube-controller-manager.yaml
on the master node and set the --feature-gates parameter to include RotateKubeletServerCertificate=true.
--feature-gates=RotateKubeletServerCertificate=true

Problem solved and 1.3.2 is passing:

root@cluster2-controlplane1:~# kube-bench run --targets=master | grep 1.3.2
[PASS] 1.3.2 Ensure that the --profiling argument is set to false (Scored)
 
Number 2

Next task (2) is to check the ownership of directory /var/lib/etcd, so we first have a look:

âžś root@cluster2-controlplane1:~# ls -lh /var/lib | grep etcd
drwx------  3 root      root      4.0K Sep 11 20:08 etcd

Looks like user root and group root. Also possible to check using:

âžś root@cluster2-controlplane1:~# stat -c %U:%G /var/lib/etcd
root:root

But what has kube-bench to say about this?

âžś root@cluster2-controlplane1:~# kube-bench run --targets=master | grep "/var/lib/etcd" -B5

1.1.12 On the etcd server node, get the etcd data directory, passed as an argument --data-dir,
from the below command:

ps -ef | grep etcd
Run the below command (based on the etcd data directory found above).
For example, chown etcd:etcd /var/lib/etcd

To comply we run the following:

âžś root@cluster2-controlplane1:~# chown etcd:etcd /var/lib/etcd

âžś root@cluster2-controlplane1:~# ls -lh /var/lib | grep etcd
drwx------  3 etcd      etcd      4.0K Sep 11 20:08 etcd

This looks better. We run kube-bench again, and make sure test 1.1.12. is passing.

âžś root@cluster2-controlplane1:~# kube-bench run --targets=master | grep 1.1.12
[PASS] 1.1.12 Ensure that the etcd data directory ownership is set to etcd:etcd (Scored)

Done.

Number 3

To continue with number (3), we'll head to the worker node and ensure that the kubelet configuration file has the minimum necessary permissions as recommended:

âžś ssh cluster2-node1

âžś root@cluster2-node1:~# kube-bench run --targets=node
...
== Summary ==
13 checks PASS
10 checks FAIL
2 checks WARN
0 checks INFO

Also here some passes, fails and warnings. We check the permission level of the kubelet config file:

âžś root@cluster2-node1:~# stat -c %a /var/lib/kubelet/config.yaml
777

777 is highly permissive access level and not recommended by the kube-bench guidelines:

âžś root@cluster2-node1:~# kube-bench run --targets=node | grep /var/lib/kubelet/config.yaml -B2

4.1.9 Run the following command (using the config file location identified in the Audit step)
chmod 644 /var/lib/kubelet/config.yaml

We obey and set the recommended permissions:

âžś root@cluster2-node1:~# chmod 644 /var/lib/kubelet/config.yaml

âžś root@cluster2-node1:~# stat -c %a /var/lib/kubelet/config.yaml
644

And check if test 2.2.10 is passing:

âžś root@cluster2-node1:~# kube-bench run --targets=node | grep 4.1.9
[PASS] 2.2.10 Ensure that the kubelet configuration file has permissions set to 644 or more restrictive (Scored)
Number 4

Finally for number (4), let's check whether --client-ca-file argument for the kubelet is set properly according to kube-bench recommendations:

âžś root@cluster2-node1:~# kube-bench run --targets=node | grep client-ca-file
[PASS] 4.2.3 Ensure that the --client-ca-file argument is set as appropriate (Automated)

This looks passing with 4.2.3. The other ones are about the file that the parameter points to and can be ignored here.

To further investigate we run the following command to locate the kubelet config file, and open it:

âžś root@cluster2-node1:~# ps -ef | grep kubelet
root      5157     1  2 20:28 ?        00:03:22 /usr/bin/kubelet --bootstrap-kubeconfig=/etc/kubernetes/bootstrap-kubelet.conf --kubeconfig=/etc/kubernetes/kubelet.conf --config=/var/lib/kubelet/config.yaml --network-plugin=cni --pod-infra-container-image=k8s.gcr.io/pause:3.2
root     19940 11901  0 22:38 pts/0    00:00:00 grep --color=auto kubelet
âžś root@croot@cluster2-node1:~# vim /var/lib/kubelet/config.yaml
# /var/lib/kubelet/config.yaml
apiVersion: kubelet.config.k8s.io/v1beta1
authentication:
  anonymous:
    enabled: false
  webhook:
    cacheTTL: 0s
    enabled: true
  x509:
    clientCAFile: /etc/kubernetes/pki/ca.crt
...

The clientCAFile points to the location of the certificate, which is correct.

Question 6 | Verify Platform Binaries

Task weight: 2%

(can be solved in any kubectl context)

There are four Kubernetes server binaries located at /opt/course/6/binaries. You're provided with the following verified sha512 values for these:

kube-apiserver

f417c0555bc0167355589dd1afe23be9bf909bf98312b1025f12015d1b58a1c62c9908c0067a7764fa35efdac7016a9efa8711a44425dd6692906a7c283f032c

kube-controller-manager

60100cc725e91fe1a949e1b2d0474237844b5862556e25c2c655a33boa8225855ec5ee22fa4927e6c46a60d43a7c4403a27268f96fbb726307d1608b44f38a60

kube-proxy

52f9d8ad045f8eee1d689619ef8ceef2d86d50c75a6a332653240d7ba5b2a114aca056d9e513984ade24358c9662714973c1960c62a5cb37dd375631c8a614c6

kubelet

4be40f2440619e990897cf956c32800dc96c2c983bf64519854a3309fa5aa21827991559f9c44595098e27e6f2ee4d64a3fdec6baba8a177881f20e3ec61e26c

Delete those binaries that don't match with the sha512 values above.

Answer:

We check the directory:

âžś cd /opt/course/6/binaries

âžś ls
kube-apiserver  kube-controller-manager  kube-proxy  kubelet

To generate the sha512 sum of a binary we do:

âžś sha512sum kube-apiserver 
f417c0555bc0167355589dd1afe23be9bf909bf98312b1025f12015d1b58a1c62c9908c0067a7764fa35efdac7016a9efa8711a44425dd6692906a7c283f032c  kube-apiserver

Looking good, next:

âžś sha512sum kube-controller-manager
60100cc725e91fe1a949e1b2d0474237844b5862556e25c2c655a33b0a8225855ec5ee22fa4927e6c46a60d43a7c4403a27268f96fbb726307d1608b44f38a60  kube-controller-manager

Okay, next:

âžś sha512sum kube-proxy
52f9d8ad045f8eee1d689619ef8ceef2d86d50c75a6a332653240d7ba5b2a114aca056d9e513984ade24358c9662714973c1960c62a5cb37dd375631c8a614c6  kube-proxy

Also good, and finally:

âžś sha512sum kubelet
7b720598e6a3483b45c537b57d759e3e82bc5c53b3274f681792f62e941019cde3d51a7f9b55158abf3810d506146bc0aa7cf97b36f27f341028a54431b335be  kubelet

Catch! Binary kubelet has a different hash!

But did we actually compare everything properly before? Let's have a closer look at kube-controller-manager again:

âžś sha512sum kube-controller-manager > compare

âžś vim compare 

Edit to only have the provided hash and the generated one in one line each:

# ./compare
60100cc725e91fe1a949e1b2d0474237844b5862556e25c2c655a33b0a8225855ec5ee22fa4927e6c46a60d43a7c4403a27268f96fbb726307d1608b44f38a60  
60100cc725e91fe1a949e1b2d0474237844b5862556e25c2c655a33boa8225855ec5ee22fa4927e6c46a60d43a7c4403a27268f96fbb726307d1608b44f38a60

Looks right at a first glance, but if we do:

âžś cat compare | uniq
60100cc725e91fe1a949e1b2d0474237844b5862556e25c2c655a33b0a8225855ec5ee22fa4927e6c46a60d43a7c4403a27268f96fbb726307d1608b44f38a60
60100cc725e91fe1a949e1b2d0474237844b5862556e25c2c655a33boa8225855ec5ee22fa4927e6c46a60d43a7c4403a27268f96fbb726307d1608b44f38a60

This shows they are different, by just one character actually.

To complete the task we do:

rm kubelet kube-controller-manager

Question 7 | Open Policy Agent

Task weight: 6%

Use context: kubectl config use-context infra-prod

The Open Policy Agent and Gatekeeper have been installed to, among other things, enforce blacklisting of certain image registries. Alter the existing constraint and/or template to also blacklist images from very-bad-registry.com.

Test it by creating a single Pod using image very-bad-registry.com/image in Namespace default, it shouldn't work.

You can also verify your changes by looking at the existing Deployment untrusted in Namespace default, it uses an image from the new untrusted source. The OPA contraint should throw violation messages for this one.

Answer:

We look at existing OPA constraints, these are implemeted using CRDs by Gatekeeper:

âžś k get crd
NAME                                                 CREATED AT
blacklistimages.constraints.gatekeeper.sh            2020-09-14T19:29:31Z
configs.config.gatekeeper.sh                         2020-09-14T19:29:04Z
constraintpodstatuses.status.gatekeeper.sh           2020-09-14T19:29:05Z
constrainttemplatepodstatuses.status.gatekeeper.sh   2020-09-14T19:29:05Z
constrainttemplates.templates.gatekeeper.sh          2020-09-14T19:29:05Z
requiredlabels.constraints.gatekeeper.sh             2020-09-14T19:29:31Z

So we can do:

âžś k get constraint
NAME                                                           AGE
blacklistimages.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/pod-trusted-images   10m

NAME                                                                  AGE
requiredlabels.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/namespace-mandatory-labels   10m

and then look at the one that is probably about blacklisting images:

k edit blacklistimages pod-trusted-images
# kubectl edit blacklistimages pod-trusted-images
apiVersion: constraints.gatekeeper.sh/v1beta1
kind: BlacklistImages
metadata:
...
spec:
  match:
    kinds:
    - apiGroups:
      - ""
      kinds:
      - Pod

It looks like this constraint simply applies the template to all Pods, no arguments passed. So we edit the template:

k edit constrainttemplates blacklistimages
# kubectl edit constrainttemplates blacklistimages
apiVersion: templates.gatekeeper.sh/v1beta1
kind: ConstraintTemplate
metadata:
...
spec:
  crd:
    spec:
      names:
        kind: BlacklistImages
  targets:
  - rego: |
      package k8strustedimages

      images {
        image := input.review.object.spec.containers[_].image
        not startswith(image, "docker-fake.io/")
        not startswith(image, "google-gcr-fake.com/")
        not startswith(image, "very-bad-registry.com/") # ADD THIS LINE
      }

      violation[{"msg": msg}] {
        not images
        msg := "not trusted image!"
      }
    target: admission.k8s.gatekeeper.sh

We simply have to add another line. After editing we try to create a Pod of the bad image:

âžś k run opa-test --image=very-bad-registry.com/image
Error from server ([denied by pod-trusted-images] not trusted image!): admission webhook "validation.gatekeeper.sh" denied the request: [denied by pod-trusted-images] not trusted image!

Nice! After some time we can also see that Pods of the existing Deployment "untrusted" will be listed as violators:

âžś k describe blacklistimages pod-trusted-images
...
  Total Violations:  2
  Violations:
    Enforcement Action:  deny
    Kind:                Namespace
    Message:             you must provide labels: {"security-level"}
    Name:                sidecar-injector
    Enforcement Action:  deny
    Kind:                Pod
    Message:             not trusted image!
    Name:                untrusted-68c4944d48-tfsnb
    Namespace:           default
Events:                  <none>

Great, OPA fights bad registries !

Question 8 | Secure Kubernetes Dashboard

Task weight: 3%

Use context: kubectl config use-context workload-prod

The Kubernetes Dashboard is installed in Namespace kubernetes-dashboard and is configured to:

  • Allow users to "skip login"
  • Allow insecure access (HTTP without authentication)
  • Allow basic authentication
  • Allow access from outside the cluster

You are asked to make it more secure by:

  • Deny users to "skip login"
  • Deny insecure access, enforce HTTPS (self signed certificates are ok for now)
  • Add the --auto-generate-certificates argument
  • Enforce authentication using a token (with possibility to use RBAC)
  • Allow only cluster internal access

Answer:

Head to https://github.com/kubernetes/dashboard/tree/master/docs to find documentation about the dashboard. This link is not on the allowed list of urls during the real exam. This means you should be provided will all information necessary in case of a task like this.

First we have a look in Namespace kubernetes-dashboard:

âžś k -n kubernetes-dashboard get pod,svc
NAME                                             READY   STATUS    RESTARTS   AGE
pod/dashboard-metrics-scraper-7b59f7d4df-fbpd9   1/1     Running   0          24m
pod/kubernetes-dashboard-6d8cd5dd84-w7wr2        1/1     Running   0          24m

NAME                                TYPE        ...   PORT(S)                        AGE
service/dashboard-metrics-scraper   ClusterIP   ...   8000/TCP                       24m
service/kubernetes-dashboard        NodePort    ...   9090:32520/TCP,443:31206/TCP   24m

We can see one running Pod and a NodePort Service exposing it. Let's try to connect to it via a NodePort, we can use IP of any Node:

(your port might be a different)

âžś k get node -o wide
NAME                     STATUS   ROLES    AGE   VERSION   INTERNAL-IP    ...
cluster1-controlplane1   Ready    master   37m   v1.24.1   192.168.100.11 ...
cluster1-node1           Ready    <none>   36m   v1.24.1   192.168.100.12 ...
cluster1-node2           Ready    <none>   34m   v1.24.1   192.168.100.13 ...

âžś curl http://192.168.100.11:32520
<!--
Copyright 2017 The Kubernetes Authors.

Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
You may obtain a copy of the License at

    http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
    

The dashboard is not secured because it allows unsecure HTTP access without authentication and is exposed externally. It's is loaded with a few parameter making it insecure, let's fix this.

First we create a backup in case we need to undo something:

k -n kubernetes-dashboard get deploy kubernetes-dashboard -oyaml > 8_deploy_kubernetes-dashboard.yaml

Then:

k -n kubernetes-dashboard edit deploy kubernetes-dashboard

The changes to make are :

  template:
    spec:
      containers:
      - args:
        - --namespace=kubernetes-dashboard  
        - --authentication-mode=token        # change or delete, "token" is default
        - --auto-generate-certificates       # add
        #- --enable-skip-login=true          # delete or set to false
        #- --enable-insecure-login           # delete
        image: kubernetesui/dashboard:v2.0.3
        imagePullPolicy: Always
        name: kubernetes-dashboard

Next, we'll have to deal with the NodePort Service:

k -n kubernetes-dashboard get svc kubernetes-dashboard -o yaml > 8_svc_kubernetes-dashboard.yaml # backup

k -n kubernetes-dashboard edit svc kubernetes-dashboard

And make the following changes:

 spec:
  clusterIP: 10.107.176.19
  externalTrafficPolicy: Cluster   # delete
  internalTrafficPolicy: Cluster
  ports:
  - name: http
    nodePort: 32513                # delete
    port: 9090
    protocol: TCP
    targetPort: 9090
  - name: https
    nodePort: 32441                # delete
    port: 443
    protocol: TCP
    targetPort: 8443
  selector:
    k8s-app: kubernetes-dashboard
  sessionAffinity: None
  type: ClusterIP                  # change or delete
status:
  loadBalancer: {}

Let's confirm the changes, we can do that even without having a browser:

âžś k run tmp --image=nginx:1.19.2 --restart=Never --rm -it -- bash
If you don't see a command prompt, try pressing enter.
root@tmp:/# curl http://kubernetes-dashboard.kubernetes-dashboard:9090
curl: (7) Failed to connect to kubernetes-dashboard.kubernetes-dashboard port 9090: Connection refused

âžś root@tmp:/# curl https://kubernetes-dashboard.kubernetes-dashboard
curl: (60) SSL certificate problem: self signed certificate
More details here: https://curl.haxx.se/docs/sslcerts.html

curl failed to verify the legitimacy of the server and therefore could not
establish a secure connection to it. To learn more about this situation and
how to fix it, please visit the web page mentioned above.

âžś root@tmp:/# curl https://kubernetes-dashboard.kubernetes-dashboard -k
<!--
Copyright 2017 The Kubernetes Authors.

We see that insecure access is disabled and HTTPS works (using a self signed certificate for now). Let's also check the remote access:

(your port might be a different)

âžś curl http://192.168.100.11:32520
curl: (7) Failed to connect to 192.168.100.11 port 32520: Connection refused

âžś k -n kubernetes-dashboard get svc
NAME                        TYPE        CLUSTER-IP       ...   PORT(S)
dashboard-metrics-scraper   ClusterIP   10.111.171.247   ...   8000/TCP
kubernetes-dashboard        ClusterIP   10.100.118.128   ...   9090/TCP,443/TCP

Much better.

Question 9 | AppArmor Profile

Task weight: 3%

Use context: kubectl config use-context workload-prod

Some containers need to run more secure and restricted. There is an existing AppArmor profile located at /opt/course/9/profile for this.

  • Install the AppArmor profile on Node cluster1-node1. Connect using ssh cluster1-node1.

  • Add label security=apparmor to the Node

  • Create a Deployment named apparmor in Namespace default with:

    • One replica of image nginx:1.19.2
    • NodeSelector for security=apparmor
    • Single container named c1 with the AppArmor profile enabled

The Pod might not run properly with the profile enabled. Write the logs of the Pod into /opt/course/9/logs so another team can work on getting the application running.

Answer:

https://kubernetes.io/docs/tutorials/clusters/apparmor

Part 1

First we have a look at the provided profile:

vim /opt/course/9/profile
# /opt/course/9/profile 

#include <tunables/global>
  
profile very-secure flags=(attach_disconnected) {
  #include <abstractions/base>

  file,

  # Deny all file writes.
  deny /** w,
}

Very simple profile named very-secure which denies all file writes. Next we copy it onto the Node:

âžś scp /opt/course/9/profile cluster1-node1:~/
Warning: Permanently added the ECDSA host key for IP address '192.168.100.12' to the list of known hosts.
profile                                                                           100%  161   329.9KB/s   00:00

âžś ssh cluster1-node1

âžś root@cluster1-node1:~# ls
profile

And install it:

âžś root@cluster1-node1:~# apparmor_parser -q ./profile

Verify it has been installed:

âžś root@cluster1-node1:~# apparmor_status
apparmor module is loaded.
17 profiles are loaded.
17 profiles are in enforce mode.
   /sbin/dhclient
...
   man_filter
   man_groff
   very-secure
0 profiles are in complain mode.
56 processes have profiles defined.
56 processes are in enforce mode.
...
0 processes are in complain mode.
0 processes are unconfined but have a profile defined.

There we see among many others the very-secure one, which is the name of the profile specified in /opt/course/9/profile.

Part 2

We label the Node:

k label -h # show examples

k label node cluster1-node1 security=apparmor
Part 3

Now we can go ahead and create the Deployment which uses the profile.

k create deploy apparmor --image=nginx:1.19.2 $do > 9_deploy.yaml
vim 9_deploy.yaml
# 9_deploy.yaml
apiVersion: apps/v1
kind: Deployment
metadata:
  creationTimestamp: null
  labels:
    app: apparmor
  name: apparmor
  namespace: default
spec:
  replicas: 1
  selector:
    matchLabels:
      app: apparmor
  strategy: {}
  template:
    metadata:
      creationTimestamp: null
      labels:
        app: apparmor
      annotations:                                                                 # add
        container.apparmor.security.beta.kubernetes.io/c1: localhost/very-secure   # add
    spec:
      nodeSelector:                    # add
        security: apparmor             # add
      containers:
      - image: nginx:1.19.2
        name: c1                       # change
        resources: {}
k -f 9_deploy.yaml create

What the damage?

âžś k get pod -owide | grep apparmor
apparmor-85c65645dc-jbch8     0/1     CrashLoopBackOff  ...   cluster1-node1

âžś k logs apparmor-85c65645dc-w852p
/docker-entrypoint.sh: 13: /docker-entrypoint.sh: cannot create /dev/null: Permission denied
/docker-entrypoint.sh: No files found in /docker-entrypoint.d/, skipping configuration
2021/09/15 11:51:57 [emerg] 1#1: mkdir() "/var/cache/nginx/client_temp" failed (13: Permission denied)
nginx: [emerg] mkdir() "/var/cache/nginx/client_temp" failed (13: Permission denied)

This looks alright, the Pod is running on cluster1-node1 because of the nodeSelector. The AppArmor profile simply denies all filesystem writes, but Nginx needs to write into some locations to run, hence the errors.

It looks like our profile is running but we can confirm this as well by inspecting the container:

âžś ssh cluster1-node1

âžś root@cluster1-node1:~# crictl pods | grep apparmor
be5c0aecee7c7       4 minutes ago       Ready               apparmor-85c65645dc-jbch8   ...

âžś root@cluster1-node1:~# crictl ps -a | grep be5c0aecee7c7
e4d91cbdf72fb    ...  Exited       c1           6            be5c0aecee7c7

âžś root@cluster1-node1:~# crictl inspect e4d91cbdf72fb | grep -i profile
          "apparmor_profile": "localhost/very-secure",
        "apparmorProfile": "very-secure",
        

First we find the Pod by it's name and get the pod-id. Next we use crictl ps -a to also show stopped containers. Then crictl inspect shows that the container is using our AppArmor profile. Notice to be fast between ps and inspect as K8s will restart the Pod periodically when in error state.

To complete the task we write the logs into the required location:

k logs apparmor-85c65645dc-jbch8 > /opt/course/9/logs

Fixing the errors is the job of another team, lucky us.

Question 10 | Container Runtime Sandbox gVisor

Task weight: 4%

Use context: kubectl config use-context workload-prod

Team purple wants to run some of their workloads more secure. Worker node cluster1-node2 has container engine containerd already installed and its configured to support the runsc/gvisor runtime.

Create a RuntimeClass named gvisor with handler runsc.

Create a Pod that uses the RuntimeClass. The Pod should be in Namespace team-purple, named gvisor-test and of image nginx:1.19.2. Make sure the Pod runs on cluster1-node2.

Write the dmesg output of the successfully started Pod into /opt/course/10/gvisor-test-dmesg.

Answer:

We check the nodes and we can see that all are using containerd:

âžś k get node -o wide
NAME                     STATUS   ROLES              ... CONTAINER-RUNTIME
cluster1-controlplane1   Ready    control-plane      ... containerd://1.5.2
cluster1-node1           Ready    <none>             ... containerd://1.5.2
cluster1-node2           Ready    <none>             ... containerd://1.5.2

But just one has containerd configured to work with runsc/gvisor runtime which is cluster1-node2.

(Optionally) we ssh into the worker node and check if containerd+runsc is configured:

âžś ssh cluster1-node2

âžś root@cluster1-node2:~# runsc --version
runsc version release-20201130.0
spec: 1.0.1-dev

âžś root@cluster1-node2:~# cat /etc/containerd/config.toml | grep runsc
  [plugins."io.containerd.grpc.v1.cri".containerd.runtimes.runsc]
    runtime_type = "io.containerd.runsc.v1"

Now we best head to the k8s docs for RuntimeClasses https://kubernetes.io/docs/concepts/containers/runtime-class, steal an example and create the gvisor one:

vim 10_rtc.yaml
# 10_rtc.yaml
apiVersion: node.k8s.io/v1
kind: RuntimeClass
metadata:
  name: gvisor
handler: runsc
k -f 10_rtc.yaml create

And the required Pod:

k -n team-purple run gvisor-test --image=nginx:1.19.2 $do > 10_pod.yaml
vim 10_pod.yaml
# 10_pod.yaml
apiVersion: v1
kind: Pod
metadata:
  creationTimestamp: null
  labels:
    run: gvisor-test
  name: gvisor-test
  namespace: team-purple
spec:
  nodeName: cluster1-node2 # add
  runtimeClassName: gvisor   # add
  containers:
  - image: nginx:1.19.2
    name: gvisor-test
    resources: {}
  dnsPolicy: ClusterFirst
  restartPolicy: Always
status: {}
k -f 10_pod.yaml create

After creating the pod we should check if its running and if it uses the gvisor sandbox:

âžś k -n team-purple get pod gvisor-test
NAME          READY   STATUS    RESTARTS   AGE
gvisor-test   1/1     Running   0          30s

âžś k -n team-purple exec gvisor-test -- dmesg
[    0.000000] Starting gVisor...
[    0.417740] Checking naughty and nice process list...
[    0.623721] Waiting for children...
[    0.902192] Gathering forks...
[    1.258087] Committing treasure map to memory...
[    1.653149] Generating random numbers by fair dice roll...
[    1.918386] Creating cloned children...
[    2.137450] Digging up root...
[    2.369841] Forking spaghetti code...
[    2.840216] Rewriting operating system in Javascript...
[    2.956226] Creating bureaucratic processes...
[    3.329981] Ready!

Looking good. And as required we finally write the dmesg output into the file:

k -n team-purple exec gvisor-test > /opt/course/10/gvisor-test-dmesg -- dmesg

Question 11 | Secrets in ETCD

Task weight: 7%

Use context: kubectl config use-context workload-prod

There is an existing Secret called database-access in Namespace team-green.

Read the complete Secret content directly from ETCD (using etcdctl) and store it into /opt/course/11/etcd-secret-content. Write the plain and decoded Secret's value of key "pass" into /opt/course/11/database-password.

Answer:

Let's try to get the Secret value directly from ETCD, which will work since it isn't encrypted.

First, we ssh into the master node where ETCD is running in this setup and check if etcdctl is installed and list its options:

âžś ssh cluster1-controlplane1

âžś root@cluster1-controlplane1:~# etcdctl
NAME:
   etcdctl - A simple command line client for etcd.

WARNING:
   Environment variable ETCDCTL_API is not set; defaults to etcdctl v2.
   Set environment variable ETCDCTL_API=3 to use v3 API or ETCDCTL_API=2 to use v2 API.

USAGE:
   etcdctl [global options] command [command options] [arguments...]
...
   --cert-file value   identify HTTPS client using this SSL certificate file
   --key-file value    identify HTTPS client using this SSL key file
   --ca-file value     verify certificates of HTTPS-enabled servers using this CA bundle
...

Among others we see arguments to identify ourselves. The apiserver connects to ETCD, so we can run the following command to get the path of the necessary .crt and .key files:

cat /etc/kubernetes/manifests/kube-apiserver.yaml | grep etcd

The output is as follows :

    - --etcd-cafile=/etc/kubernetes/pki/etcd/ca.crt
    - --etcd-certfile=/etc/kubernetes/pki/apiserver-etcd-client.crt
    - --etcd-keyfile=/etc/kubernetes/pki/apiserver-etcd-client.key
    - --etcd-servers=https://127.0.0.1:2379 # optional since we're on same node

With this information we query ETCD for the secret value:

âžś root@cluster1-controlplane1:~# ETCDCTL_API=3 etcdctl \
--cert /etc/kubernetes/pki/apiserver-etcd-client.crt \
--key /etc/kubernetes/pki/apiserver-etcd-client.key \
--cacert /etc/kubernetes/pki/etcd/ca.crt get /registry/secrets/team-green/database-access

ETCD in Kubernetes stores data under /registry/{type}/{namespace}/{name}. This is how we came to look for /registry/secrets/team-green/database-access. There is also an example on a page in the k8s documentation which you could save as a bookmark to access fast during the exam.

The tasks requires us to store the output on our terminal. For this we can simply copy&paste the content into a new file on our terminal:

# /opt/course/11/etcd-secret-content
/registry/secrets/team-green/database-access
k8s


v1Secret

database-access
team-green"*$3e0acd78-709d-4f07-bdac-d5193d0f2aa32bB
0kubectl.kubernetes.io/last-applied-configuration{"apiVersion":"v1","data":{"pass":"Y29uZmlkZW50aWFs"},"kind":"Secret","metadata":{"annotations":{},"name":"database-access","namespace":"team-green"}}
z
kubectl-client-side-applyUpdatevFieldsV1:
{"f:data":{".":{},"f:pass":{}},"f:metadata":{"f:annotations":{".":{},"f:kubectl.kubernetes.io/last-applied-configuration":{}}},"f:type":{}}
pass
    confidentialOpaque"
    

We're also required to store the plain and "decrypted" database password. For this we can copy the base64-encoded value from the ETCD output and run on our terminal:

âžś echo Y29uZmlkZW50aWFs | base64 -d > /opt/course/11/database-password

âžś cat /opt/course/11/database-password
confidential

Question 12 | Hack Secrets

Task weight: 8%

Use context: kubectl config use-context restricted@infra-prod

You're asked to investigate a possible permission escape in Namespace restricted. The context authenticates as user restricted which has only limited permissions and shouldn't be able to read Secret values.

Try to find the password-key values of the Secrets secret1, secret2 and secret3 in Namespace restricted. Write the decoded plaintext values into files /opt/course/12/secret1, /opt/course/12/secret2 and /opt/course/12/secret3.

Answer:

First we should explore the boundaries, we can try:

âžś k -n restricted get role,rolebinding,clusterrole,clusterrolebinding
Error from server (Forbidden): roles.rbac.authorization.k8s.io is forbidden: User "restricted" cannot list resource "roles" in API group "rbac.authorization.k8s.io" in the namespace "restricted"
Error from server (Forbidden): rolebindings.rbac.authorization.k8s.io is forbidden: User "restricted" cannot list resource "rolebindings" in API group "rbac.authorization.k8s.io" in the namespace "restricted"
Error from server (Forbidden): clusterroles.rbac.authorization.k8s.io is forbidden: User "restricted" cannot list resource "clusterroles" in API group "rbac.authorization.k8s.io" at the cluster scope
Error from server (Forbidden): clusterrolebindings.rbac.authorization.k8s.io is forbidden: User "restricted" cannot list resource "clusterrolebindings" in API group "rbac.authorization.k8s.io" at the cluster scope

But no permissions to view RBAC resources. So we try the obvious:

âžś k -n restricted get secret
Error from server (Forbidden): secrets is forbidden: User "restricted" cannot list resource "secrets" in API group "" in the namespace "restricted"

âžś k -n restricted get secret -o yaml
apiVersion: v1
items: []
kind: List
metadata:
  resourceVersion: ""
  selfLink: ""
Error from server (Forbidden): secrets is forbidden: User "restricted" cannot list resource "secrets" in API group "" in the namespace "restricted"

We're not allowed to get or list any Secrets. What can we see though?

âžś k -n restricted get all
NAME                    READY   STATUS    RESTARTS   AGE
pod1-fd5d64b9c-pcx6q    1/1     Running   0          37s
pod2-6494f7699b-4hks5   1/1     Running   0          37s
pod3-748b48594-24s76    1/1     Running   0          37s
Error from server (Forbidden): replicationcontrollers is forbidden: User "restricted" cannot list resource "replicationcontrollers" in API group "" in the namespace "restricted"
Error from server (Forbidden): services is forbidden: User "restricted" cannot list resource "services" in API group "" in the namespace "restricted"
...

There are some Pods, lets check these out regarding Secret access:

k -n restricted get pod -o yaml | grep -i secret

This output provides us with enough information to do:

âžś k -n restricted exec pod1-fd5d64b9c-pcx6q -- cat /etc/secret-volume/password
you-are

âžś echo you-are > /opt/course/12/secret1

And for the second Secret:

âžś k -n restricted exec pod2-6494f7699b-4hks5 -- env | grep PASS
PASSWORD=an-amazing

âžś echo an-amazing > /opt/course/12/secret2

None of the Pods seem to mount secret3 though. Can we create or edit existing Pods to mount secret3?

âžś k -n restricted run test --image=nginx
Error from server (Forbidden): pods is forbidden: User "restricted" cannot create resource "pods" in API group "" in the namespace "restricted"

âžś k -n restricted delete pod pod1
Error from server (Forbidden): pods "pod1" is forbidden: User "restricted" cannot delete resource "pods" in API group "" in the namespace "restricted"

Doesn't look like it.

But the Pods seem to be able to access the Secrets, we can try to use a Pod's ServiceAccount to access the third Secret. We can actually see (like using k -n restricted get pod -o yaml | grep automountServiceAccountToken) that only Pod pod3-* has the ServiceAccount token mounted:

âžś k -n restricted exec -it pod3-748b48594-24s76 -- sh

/ # mount | grep serviceaccount
tmpfs on /run/secrets/kubernetes.io/serviceaccount type tmpfs (ro,relatime)

/ # ls /run/secrets/kubernetes.io/serviceaccount
ca.crt     namespace  token
NOTE: You should have knowledge about ServiceAccounts and how they work with Pods like described in the docs

We can see all necessary information to contact the apiserver manually:

/ # curl https://kubernetes.default/api/v1/namespaces/restricted/secrets -H "Authorization: Bearer $(cat /run/secrets/kubernetes.io/serviceaccount/token)" -k
...
    {
      "metadata": {
        "name": "secret3",
        "namespace": "restricted",
...
          }
        ]
      },
      "data": {
        "password": "cEVuRXRSYVRpT24tdEVzVGVSCg=="
      },
      "type": "Opaque"
    }
...

Let's encode it and write it into the requested location:

âžś echo cEVuRXRSYVRpT24tdEVzVGVSCg== | base64 -d
pEnEtRaTiOn-tEsTeR

âžś echo cEVuRXRSYVRpT24tdEVzVGVSCg== | base64 -d > /opt/course/12/secret3

This will give us:

# /opt/course/12/secret1
you-are
# /opt/course/12/secret2
an-amazing
# /opt/course/12/secret3
pEnEtRaTiOn-tEsTeR

We hacked all Secrets! It can be tricky to get RBAC right and secure.

NOTE: One thing to consider is that giving the permission to "list" Secrets, will also allow the user to read the Secret values like using kubectl get secrets -o yaml even without the "get" permission set.

Question 13 | Restrict access to Metadata Server

Task weight: 7%

Use context: kubectl config use-context infra-prod

There is a metadata service available at http://192.168.100.21:32000 on which Nodes can reach sensitive data, like cloud credentials for initialisation. By default, all Pods in the cluster also have access to this endpoint. The DevSecOps team has asked you to restrict access to this metadata server.

In Namespace metadata-access:

  • Create a NetworkPolicy named metadata-deny which prevents egress to 192.168.100.21 for all Pods but still allows access to everything else
  • Create a NetworkPolicy named metadata-allow which allows Pods having label role: metadata-accessor to access endpoint 192.168.100.21

There are existing Pods in the target Namespace with which you can test your policies, but don't change their labels.

Answer:

Check the Pods in the Namespace metadata-access and their labels:

âžś k -n metadata-access get pods --show-labels
NAME                    ...   LABELS
pod1-7d67b4ff9-xrcd7    ...   app=pod1,pod-template-hash=7d67b4ff9
pod2-7b6fc66944-2hc7n   ...   app=pod2,pod-template-hash=7b6fc66944
pod3-7dc879bd59-hkgrr   ...   app=pod3,role=metadata-accessor,pod-template-hash=7dc879bd59

There are three Pods in the Namespace and one of them has the label role=metadata-accessor.

Check access to the metadata server from the Pods:

âžś k exec -it -n metadata-access pod1-7d67b4ff9-xrcd7 -- curl http://192.168.100.21:32000
metadata server

âžś k exec -it -n metadata-access pod2-7b6fc66944-2hc7n -- curl http://192.168.100.21:32000
metadata server

âžś k exec -it -n metadata-access pod3-7dc879bd59-hkgrr -- curl http://192.168.100.21:32000
metadata server

All three are able to access the metadata server.

To restrict the access, we create a NetworkPolicy to deny access to the specific IP.

vim 13_metadata-deny.yaml
# 13_metadata-deny.yaml
apiVersion: networking.k8s.io/v1
kind: NetworkPolicy
metadata:
  name: metadata-deny
  namespace: metadata-access
spec:
  podSelector: {}
  policyTypes:
  - Egress
  egress:
  - to:
    - ipBlock:
        cidr: 0.0.0.0/0
        except:
        - 192.168.100.21/32
k -f 13_metadata-deny.yaml apply
NOTE: You should know about general default-deny K8s NetworkPolcies.

Verify that access to the metadata server has been blocked, but other endpoints are still accessible:

âžś k exec -it -n metadata-access pod1-7d67b4ff9-xrcd7 -- curl http://192.168.100.21:32000
curl: (28) Failed to connect to 192.168.100.21 port 32000: Operation timed out
command terminated with exit code 28

âžś kubectl exec -it -n metadata-access pod1-7d67b4ff9-xrcd7 -- curl -I https://kubernetes.io
HTTP/2 200
cache-control: public, max-age=0, must-revalidate
content-type: text/html; charset=UTF-8
date: Mon, 14 Sep 2020 15:39:39 GMT
etag: "b46e429397e5f1fecf48c10a533f5cd8-ssl"
strict-transport-security: max-age=31536000
age: 13
content-length: 22252
server: Netlify
x-nf-request-id: 1d94a1d1-6bac-4a98-b065-346f661f1db1-393998290

Similarly, verify for the other two Pods.

Now create another NetworkPolicy that allows access to the metadata server from Pods with label role=metadata-accessor.

vim 13_metadata-allow.yaml
# 13_metadata-allow.yaml
apiVersion: networking.k8s.io/v1
kind: NetworkPolicy
metadata:
  name: metadata-allow
  namespace: metadata-access
spec:
  podSelector:
    matchLabels:
      role: metadata-accessor
  policyTypes:
  - Egress
  egress:
  - to:
    - ipBlock:
        cidr: 192.168.100.21/32
k -f 13_metadata-allow.yaml apply

Verify that required Pod has access to metadata endpoint and others do not:

âžś k -n metadata-access exec pod3-7dc879bd59-hkgrr -- curl http://192.168.100.21:32000
metadata server

âžś k -n metadata-access exec pod2-7b6fc66944-9ngzr  -- curl http://192.168.100.21:32000
^Ccommand terminated with exit code 130

It only works for the Pod having the label. With this we implemented the required security restrictions.

If a Pod doesn't have a matching NetworkPolicy then all traffic is allowed from and to it. Once a Pod has a matching NP then the contained rules are additive. This means that for Pods having label metadata-accessor the rules will be combined to:

# merged policies into one for pods with label metadata-accessor
spec:
  podSelector: {}
  policyTypes:
  - Egress
  egress:
  - to: # first rule
    - ipBlock: # condition 1
        cidr: 0.0.0.0/0
        except:
        - 192.168.100.21/32
  - to: # second rule
    - ipBlock: # condition 1
        cidr: 192.168.100.21/32

We can see that the merged NP contains two separate rules with one condition each. We could read it as:

Allow outgoing traffic if:
(destination is 0.0.0.0/0 but not 192.168.100.21/32) OR (destination is 192.168.100.21/32)

Hence it allows Pods with label metadata-accessor to access everything.

Question 14 | Syscall Activity

Task weight: 4%

Use context: kubectl config use-context workload-prod

There are Pods in Namespace team-yellow. A security investigation noticed that some processes running in these Pods are using the Syscall kill, which is forbidden by a Team Yellow internal policy.

Find the offending Pod(s) and remove these by reducing the replicas of the parent Deployment to 0.

Answer:

Syscalls are used by processes running in Userspace to communicate with the Linux Kernel. There are many available syscalls: https://man7.org/linux/man-pages/man2/syscalls.2.html. It makes sense to restrict these for container processes and Docker/Containerd already restrict some by default, like the reboot Syscall. Restricting even more is possible for example using Seccomp or AppArmor.

But for this task we should simply find out which binary process executes a specific Syscall. Processes in containers are simply run on the same Linux operating system, but isolated. That's why we first check on which nodes the Pods are running:

âžś k -n team-yellow get pod -owide
NAME                                 ...   NODE               NOMINATED NODE   ...
collector1-7585cc58cb-n5rtd   1/1    ...   cluster1-node1   <none>           ...
collector1-7585cc58cb-vdlp9   1/1    ...   cluster1-node1   <none>           ...
collector2-8556679d96-z7g7c   1/1    ...   cluster1-node1   <none>           ...
collector3-8b58fdc88-pjg24    1/1    ...   cluster1-node1   <none>           ...
collector3-8b58fdc88-s9ltc    1/1    ...   cluster1-node1   <none>           ...

All on cluster1-node1, hence we ssh into it and find the processes for the first Deployment collector1 .

âžś ssh cluster1-node1

âžś root@cluster1-node1:~# crictl pods --name collector1
POD ID              CREATED             STATE        NAME                          ...
21aacb8f4ca8d       17 minutes ago      Ready        collector1-7585cc58cb-vdlp9   ...
186631e40104d       17 minutes ago      Ready        collector1-7585cc58cb-n5rtd   ...

âžś root@cluster1-node1:~# crictl ps --pod 21aacb8f4ca8d
CONTAINER ID        IMAGE               CREATED          ...       POD ID
9ea02422f8660       5d867958e04e1       12 minutes ago   ...       21aacb8f4ca8d

âžś root@cluster1-node1:~# crictl inspect 9ea02422f8660 | grep args -A1
        "args": [
          "./collector1-process"
  • Using crictl pods we first searched for the Pods of Deployment collector1, which has two replicas
  • We then took one pod-id to find it's containers using crictl ps
  • And finally we used crictl inspect to find the process name, which is collector1-process

We can find the process PIDs (two because there are two Pods):

âžś root@cluster1-node1:~# ps aux | grep collector1-process
root       35039  0.0  0.1 702208  1044 ?        Ssl  13:37   0:00 ./collector1-process
root       35059  0.0  0.1 702208  1044 ?        Ssl  13:37   0:00 ./collector1-process

Using the PIDs we can call strace to find Sycalls:

âžś root@cluster1-node1:~# strace -p 35039
strace: Process 35039 attached
futex(0x4d7e68, FUTEX_WAIT_PRIVATE, 0, NULL) = 0
kill(666, SIGTERM)                      = -1 ESRCH (No such process)
epoll_pwait(3, [], 128, 999, NULL, 1)   = 0
kill(666, SIGTERM)                      = -1 ESRCH (No such process)
epoll_pwait(3, [], 128, 999, NULL, 1)   = 0
kill(666, SIGTERM)                      = -1 ESRCH (No such process)
epoll_pwait(3, ^Cstrace: Process 35039 detached
 <detached ...>
...

First try and already a catch! We see it uses the forbidden Syscall by calling kill(666, SIGTERM).

Next let's check the Deployment collector2 processes:

âžś root@cluster1-node1:~# ps aux | grep collector2-process
root       35375  0.0  0.0 702216   604 ?        Ssl  13:37   0:00 ./collector2-process

âžś root@cluster1-node1:~# strace -p 35375
strace: Process 35375 attached
futex(0x4d9e68, FUTEX_WAIT_PRIVATE, 0, NULL) = 0
futex(0x4d9e68, FUTEX_WAIT_PRIVATE, 0, NULL) = 0
futex(0x4d9e68, FUTEX_WAIT_PRIVATE, 0, NULL) = 0
futex(0x4d9e68, FUTEX_WAIT_PRIVATE, 0, NULL) = 0
...

Looks alright. What about collector3:

âžś root@cluster1-node1:~# ps aux | grep collector3-process
root       35155  0.0  0.1 702472  1040 ?        Ssl  13:37   0:00 ./collector3-process
root       35241  0.0  0.1 702472  1044 ?        Ssl  13:37   0:00 ./collector3-process

âžś root@cluster1-node1:~# strace -p 35155
strace: Process 35155 attached
futex(0x4d9e68, FUTEX_WAIT_PRIVATE, 0, NULL) = 0
futex(0x4d9e68, FUTEX_WAIT_PRIVATE, 0, NULL) = 0
futex(0x4d9e68, FUTEX_WAIT_PRIVATE, 0, NULL) = 0
epoll_pwait(3, [], 128, 999, NULL, 1)   = 0
epoll_pwait(3, [], 128, 999, NULL, 1)   = 0
...

Also nothing about the forbidden Syscall. So we finalise the task:

k -n team-yellow scale deploy collector1 --replicas 0

And the world is a bit safer again.

Question 15 | Configure TLS on Ingress

Task weight: 4%

Use context: kubectl config use-context workload-prod

In Namespace team-pink there is an existing Nginx Ingress resources named secure which accepts two paths /app and /api which point to different ClusterIP Services.

From your main terminal you can connect to it using for example:

  • HTTP: curl -v http://secure-ingress.test:31080/app
  • HTTPS: curl -kv https://secure-ingress.test:31443/app

Right now it uses a default generated TLS certificate by the Nginx Ingress Controller.

You're asked to instead use the key and certificate provided at /opt/course/15/tls.key and /opt/course/15/tls.crt. As it's a self-signed certificate you need to use curl -k when connecting to it.

Answer:

Investigate We can get the IP address of the Ingress and we see it's the same one to which secure-ingress.test is pointing to:

âžś k -n team-pink get ing secure 
NAME     CLASS    HOSTS                 ADDRESS          PORTS   AGE
secure   <none>   secure-ingress.test   192.168.100.12   80      7m11s

âžś ping secure-ingress.test
PING cluster1-node1 (192.168.100.12) 56(84) bytes of data.
64 bytes from cluster1-node1 (192.168.100.12): icmp_seq=1 ttl=64 time=0.316 ms

Now, let's try to access the paths /app and /api via HTTP:

âžś curl http://secure-ingress.test:31080/app
This is the backend APP!

âžś curl http://secure-ingress.test:31080/api
This is the API Server!

What about HTTPS?

âžś curl https://secure-ingress.test:31443/api
curl: (60) SSL certificate problem: unable to get local issuer certificate
More details here: https://curl.haxx.se/docs/sslcerts.html

curl failed to verify the legitimacy of the server and therefore could not
establish a secure connection to it. To learn more about this situation and
how to fix it, please visit the web page mentioned above.

âžś curl -k https://secure-ingress.test:31443/api
This is the API Server!

HTTPS seems to be already working if we accept self-signed certificated using -k. But what kind of certificate is used by the server?

âžś curl -kv https://secure-ingress.test:31443/api
...
* Server certificate:
*  subject: O=Acme Co; CN=Kubernetes Ingress Controller Fake Certificate
*  start date: Sep 28 12:28:35 2020 GMT
*  expire date: Sep 28 12:28:35 2021 GMT
*  issuer: O=Acme Co; CN=Kubernetes Ingress Controller Fake Certificate
*  SSL certificate verify result: unable to get local issuer certificate (20), continuing anyway.
...

It seems to be "Kubernetes Ingress Controller Fake Certificate".

Implement own TLS certificate

First, let us generate a Secret using the provided key and certificate:

âžś cd /opt/course/15

âžś :/opt/course/15$ ls
tls.crt  tls.key

âžś :/opt/course/15$ k -n team-pink create secret tls tls-secret --key tls.key --cert tls.crt
secret/tls-secret created

Now, we configure the Ingress to make use of this Secret:

âžś k -n team-pink get ing secure -oyaml > 15_ing_bak.yaml

âžś k -n team-pink edit ing secure
# kubectl -n team-pink edit ing secure
apiVersion: networking.k8s.io/v1
kind: Ingress
metadata:
  annotations:
...
  generation: 1
  name: secure
  namespace: team-pink
...
spec:
  tls:                            # add
    - hosts:                      # add
      - secure-ingress.test       # add
      secretName: tls-secret      # add
  rules:
  - host: secure-ingress.test
    http:
      paths:
      - backend:
          service:
            name: secure-app
            port: 80
        path: /app
        pathType: ImplementationSpecific
      - backend:
          service:
            name: secure-api
            port: 80
        path: /api
        pathType: ImplementationSpecific
...

After adding the changes we check the Ingress resource again:

âžś k -n team-pink get ing
NAME     CLASS    HOSTS                 ADDRESS          PORTS     AGE
secure   <none>   secure-ingress.test   192.168.100.12   80, 443   25m

It now actually lists port 443 for HTTPS. To verify:

âžś curl -k https://secure-ingress.test:31443/api
This is the API Server!

âžś curl -kv https://secure-ingress.test:31443/api
...
* Server certificate:
*  subject: CN=secure-ingress.test; O=secure-ingress.test
*  start date: Sep 25 18:22:10 2020 GMT
*  expire date: Sep 20 18:22:10 2040 GMT
*  issuer: CN=secure-ingress.test; O=secure-ingress.test
*  SSL certificate verify result: self signed certificate (18), continuing anyway.
...

We can see that the provided certificate is now being used by the Ingress for TLS termination.

Question 16 | Docker Image Attack Surface

Task weight: 7%

Use context: kubectl config use-context workload-prod

There is a Deployment image-verify in Namespace team-blue which runs image registry.killer.sh:5000/image-verify:v1. DevSecOps has asked you to improve this image by:

  • Changing the base image to alpine:3.12
  • Not installing curl
  • Updating nginx to use the version constraint >=1.18.0
  • Running the main process as user myuser

Do not add any new lines to the Dockerfile, just edit existing ones. The file is located at /opt/course/16/image/Dockerfile.

Tag your version as v2. You can build, tag and push using:

cd /opt/course/16/image
podman build -t registry.killer.sh:5000/image-verify:v2 .
podman run registry.killer.sh:5000/image-verify:v2 # to test your changes
podman push registry.killer.sh:5000/image-verify:v2

Make the Deployment use your updated image tag v2.

Answer:

We should have a look at the Docker Image at first:

cd /opt/course/16/image

cp Dockerfile Dockerfile.bak

vim Dockerfile
# /opt/course/16/image/Dockerfile
FROM alpine:3.4
RUN apk update && apk add vim curl nginx=1.10.3-r0
RUN addgroup -S myuser && adduser -S myuser -G myuser
COPY ./run.sh run.sh
RUN ["chmod", "+x", "./run.sh"]
USER root
ENTRYPOINT ["/bin/sh", "./run.sh"]

Very simple Dockerfile which seems to execute a script run.sh :

# /opt/course/16/image/run.sh
while true; do date; id; echo; sleep 1; done

So it only outputs current date and credential information in a loop. We can see that output in the existing Deployment image-verify:

âžś k -n team-blue logs -f -l id=image-verify
Fri Sep 25 20:59:12 UTC 2020
uid=0(root) gid=0(root) groups=0(root),1(bin),2(daemon),3(sys),4(adm),6(disk),10(wheel),11(floppy),20(dialout),26(tape),27(video)

We see its running as root.

Next we update the Dockerfile according to the requirements:

# /opt/course/16/image/Dockerfile

# change
FROM alpine:3.12

# change
RUN apk update && apk add vim nginx>=1.18.0

RUN addgroup -S myuser && adduser -S myuser -G myuser
COPY ./run.sh run.sh
RUN ["chmod", "+x", "./run.sh"]

# change
USER myuser

ENTRYPOINT ["/bin/sh", "./run.sh"]

Then we build the new image:

âžś :/opt/course/16/image$ podman build -t registry.killer.sh:5000/image-verify:v2 .
...
STEP 7/7: ENTRYPOINT ["/bin/sh", "./run.sh"]
COMMIT registry.killer.sh:5000/image-verify:v2
--> ceb8989101b
Successfully tagged registry.killer.sh:5000/image-verify:v2
ceb8989101bccd9f6b9c3b4c6c75f6c3561f19a5b784edd1f1a36fa0fb34a9df

We can then test our changes by running the container locally:

âžś :/opt/course/16/image$ podman run registry.killer.sh:5000/image-verify:v2 
Thu Sep 16 06:01:47 UTC 2021
uid=101(myuser) gid=102(myuser) groups=102(myuser)

Thu Sep 16 06:01:48 UTC 2021
uid=101(myuser) gid=102(myuser) groups=102(myuser)

Thu Sep 16 06:01:49 UTC 2021
uid=101(myuser) gid=102(myuser) groups=102(myuser)

Looking good, so we push:

âžś :/opt/course/16/image$ podman push registry.killer.sh:5000/image-verify:v2
Getting image source signatures
Copying blob cd0853834d88 done  
Copying blob 5298d0709c3e skipped: already exists  
Copying blob e6688e911f15 done  
Copying blob dbc406096645 skipped: already exists  
Copying blob 98895ed393d9 done  
Copying config ceb8989101 done  
Writing manifest to image destination
Storing signatures

And we update the Deployment to use the new image:

k -n team-blue edit deploy image-verify
# kubectl -n team-blue edit deploy image-verify
apiVersion: apps/v1
kind: Deployment
metadata:
...
spec:
...
  template:
...
    spec:
      containers:
      - image: registry.killer.sh:5000/image-verify:v2 # change

And afterwards we can verify our changes by looking at the Pod logs:

âžś k -n team-blue logs -f -l id=image-verify
Fri Sep 25 21:06:55 UTC 2020
uid=101(myuser) gid=102(myuser) groups=102(myuser)

Also to verify our changes even further:

âžś k -n team-blue exec image-verify-55fbcd4c9b-x2flc -- curl
OCI runtime exec failed: exec failed: container_linux.go:349: starting container process caused "exec: \"curl\": executable file not found in $PATH": unknown
command terminated with exit code 126

âžś k -n team-blue exec image-verify-55fbcd4c9b-x2flc -- nginx -v
nginx version: nginx/1.18.0

Another task solved.

Question 17 | Audit Log Policy

Task weight: 7%

Use context: kubectl config use-context infra-prod

Audit Logging has been enabled in the cluster with an Audit Policy located at /etc/kubernetes/audit/policy.yaml on cluster2-controlplane1.

Change the configuration so that only one backup of the logs is stored.

Alter the Policy in a way that it only stores logs:

  • From Secret resources, level Metadata
  • From "system:nodes" userGroups, level RequestResponse

After you altered the Policy make sure to empty the log file so it only contains entries according to your changes, like using truncate -s 0 /etc/kubernetes/audit/logs/audit.log.

NOTE: You can use jq to render json more readable. cat data.json | jq

Answer:

First we check the apiserver configuration and change as requested:

âžś ssh cluster2-controlplane1

âžś root@cluster2-controlplane1:~# cp /etc/kubernetes/manifests/kube-apiserver.yaml ~/17_kube-apiserver.yaml # backup

âžś root@cluster2-controlplane1:~# vim /etc/kubernetes/manifests/kube-apiserver.yaml 
# /etc/kubernetes/manifests/kube-apiserver.yaml 
apiVersion: v1
kind: Pod
metadata:
  annotations:
    kubeadm.kubernetes.io/kube-apiserver.advertise-address.endpoint: 192.168.100.21:6443
  creationTimestamp: null
  labels:
    component: kube-apiserver
    tier: control-plane
  name: kube-apiserver
  namespace: kube-system
spec:
  containers:
  - command:
    - kube-apiserver
    - --audit-policy-file=/etc/kubernetes/audit/policy.yaml
    - --audit-log-path=/etc/kubernetes/audit/logs/audit.log
    - --audit-log-maxsize=5
    - --audit-log-maxbackup=1                                    # CHANGE
    - --advertise-address=192.168.100.21
    - --allow-privileged=true
...
NOTE: You should know how to enable Audit Logging completely yourself as described in the docs. Feel free to try this in another cluster in this environment.

Now we look at the existing Policy:

âžś root@cluster2-controlplane1:~# vim /etc/kubernetes/audit/policy.yaml
# /etc/kubernetes/audit/policy.yaml
apiVersion: audit.k8s.io/v1
kind: Policy
rules:
- level: Metadata

We can see that this simple Policy logs everything on Metadata level. So we change it to the requirements:

# /etc/kubernetes/audit/policy.yaml
apiVersion: audit.k8s.io/v1
kind: Policy
rules:

# log Secret resources audits, level Metadata
- level: Metadata
  resources:
  - group: ""
    resources: ["secrets"]

# log node related audits, level RequestResponse
- level: RequestResponse
  userGroups: ["system:nodes"]

# for everything else don't log anything
- level: None

After saving the changes we have to restart the apiserver:

âžś root@cluster2-controlplane1:~# cd /etc/kubernetes/manifests/

âžś root@cluster2-controlplane1:/etc/kubernetes/manifests# mv kube-apiserver.yaml ..

âžś root@cluster2-controlplane1:/etc/kubernetes/manifests# watch crictl ps # wait for apiserver gone

âžś root@cluster2-controlplane1:/etc/kubernetes/manifests# truncate -s 0 /etc/kubernetes/audit/logs/audit.log

âžś root@cluster2-controlplane1:/etc/kubernetes/manifests# mv ../kube-apiserver.yaml .

Once the apiserver is running again we can check the new logs and scroll through some entries:

cat audit.log | tail | jq
{
  "kind": "Event",
  "apiVersion": "audit.k8s.io/v1",
  "level": "Metadata",
  "auditID": "e598dc9e-fc8b-4213-aee3-0719499ab1bd",
  "stage": "RequestReceived",
  "requestURI": "...",
  "verb": "watch",
  "user": {
    "username": "system:serviceaccount:gatekeeper-system:gatekeeper-admin",
    "uid": "79870838-75a8-479b-ad42-4b7b75bd17a3",
    "groups": [
      "system:serviceaccounts",
      "system:serviceaccounts:gatekeeper-system",
      "system:authenticated"
    ]
  },
  "sourceIPs": [
    "192.168.102.21"
  ],
  "userAgent": "manager/v0.0.0 (linux/amd64) kubernetes/$Format",
  "objectRef": {
    "resource": "secrets",
    "apiVersion": "v1"
  },
  "requestReceivedTimestamp": "2020-09-27T20:01:36.238911Z",
  "stageTimestamp": "2020-09-27T20:01:36.238911Z",
  "annotations": {
    "authentication.k8s.io/legacy-token": "..."
  }
}

Above we logged a watch action by OPA Gatekeeper for Secrets, level Metadata.

{
  "kind": "Event",
  "apiVersion": "audit.k8s.io/v1",
  "level": "RequestResponse",
  "auditID": "c90e53ed-b0cf-4cc4-889a-f1204dd39267",
  "stage": "ResponseComplete",
  "requestURI": "...",
  "verb": "list",
  "user": {
    "username": "system:node:cluster2-controlplane1",
    "groups": [
      "system:nodes",
      "system:authenticated"
    ]
  },
  "sourceIPs": [
    "192.168.100.21"
  ],
  "userAgent": "kubelet/v1.19.1 (linux/amd64) kubernetes/206bcad",
  "objectRef": {
    "resource": "configmaps",
    "namespace": "kube-system",
    "name": "kube-proxy",
    "apiVersion": "v1"
  },
  "responseStatus": {
    "metadata": {},
    "code": 200
  },
  "responseObject": {
    "kind": "ConfigMapList",
    "apiVersion": "v1",
    "metadata": {
      "selfLink": "/api/v1/namespaces/kube-system/configmaps",
      "resourceVersion": "83409"
    },
    "items": [
      {
        "metadata": {
          "name": "kube-proxy",
          "namespace": "kube-system",
          "selfLink": "/api/v1/namespaces/kube-system/configmaps/kube-proxy",
          "uid": "0f1c3950-430a-4543-83e4-3f9c87a478b8",
          "resourceVersion": "232",
          "creationTimestamp": "2020-09-26T20:59:50Z",
          "labels": {
            "app": "kube-proxy"
          },
          "annotations": {
            "kubeadm.kubernetes.io/component-config.hash": "..."
          },
          "managedFields": [
            {
...
            }
          ]
        },
...
      }
    ]
  },
  "requestReceivedTimestamp": "2020-09-27T20:01:36.223781Z",
  "stageTimestamp": "2020-09-27T20:01:36.225470Z",
  "annotations": {
    "authorization.k8s.io/decision": "allow",
    "authorization.k8s.io/reason": ""
  }
}

And in the one above we logged a list action by system:nodes for a ConfigMaps, level RequestResponse.

Because all JSON entries are written in a single line in the file we could also run some simple verifications on our Policy:

# shows Secret entries
cat audit.log | grep '"resource":"secrets"' | wc -l

# confirms Secret entries are only of level Metadata
cat audit.log | grep '"resource":"secrets"' | grep -v '"level":"Metadata"' | wc -l

# shows RequestResponse level entries
cat audit.log | grep -v '"level":"RequestResponse"' | wc -l

# shows RequestResponse level entries are only for system:nodes
cat audit.log | grep '"level":"RequestResponse"' | grep -v "system:nodes" | wc -l

Looks like our job is done.

Question 18 | Investigate Break-in via Audit Log

Task weight: 4%

Use context: kubectl config use-context infra-prod

Namespace security contains five Secrets of type Opaque which can be considered highly confidential. The latest Incident-Prevention-Investigation revealed that ServiceAccount p.auster had too broad access to the cluster for some time. This SA should've never had access to any Secrets in that Namespace.

Find out which Secrets in Namespace security this SA did access by looking at the Audit Logs under /opt/course/18/audit.log.

Change the password to any new string of only those Secrets that were accessed by this SA.

NOTE: You can use jq to render json more readable. cat data.json | jq

Answer: First we look at the Secrets this is about:

âžś k -n security get secret | grep Opaque kubeadmin-token Opaque 1 37m mysql-admin Opaque 1 37m postgres001 Opaque 1 37m postgres002 Opaque 1 37m vault-token Opaque 1 37m Next we investigate the Audit Log file:

âžś cd /opt/course/18

âžś :/opt/course/18$ ls -lh total 7.1M -rw-r--r-- 1 k8s k8s 7.5M Sep 24 21:31 audit.log

âžś :/opt/course/18$ cat audit.log | wc -l 4451 Audit Logs can be huge and it's common to limit the amount by creating an Audit Policy and to transfer the data in systems like Elasticsearch. In this case we have a simple JSON export, but it already contains 4451 lines.

We should try to filter the file down to relevant information:

âžś :/opt/course/18$ cat audit.log | grep "p.auster" | wc -l 28 Not too bad, only 28 logs for ServiceAccount p.auster.

âžś :/opt/course/18$ cat audit.log | grep "p.auster" | grep Secret | wc -l 2 And only 2 logs related to Secrets...

âžś :/opt/course/18$ cat audit.log | grep "p.auster" | grep Secret | grep list | wc -l 0

âžś :/opt/course/18$ cat audit.log | grep "p.auster" | grep Secret | grep get | wc -l 2 No list actions, which is good, but 2 get actions, so we check these out:

cat audit.log | grep "p.auster" | grep Secret | grep get | jq { "kind": "Event", "apiVersion": "audit.k8s.io/v1", "level": "RequestResponse", "auditID": "74fd9e03-abea-4df1-b3d0-9cfeff9ad97a", "stage": "ResponseComplete", "requestURI": "/api/v1/namespaces/security/secrets/vault-token", "verb": "get", "user": { "username": "system:serviceaccount:security:p.auster", "uid": "29ecb107-c0e8-4f2d-816a-b16f4391999c", "groups": [ "system:serviceaccounts", "system:serviceaccounts:security", "system:authenticated" ] }, ... "userAgent": "curl/7.64.0", "objectRef": { "resource": "secrets", "namespace": "security", "name": "vault-token", "apiVersion": "v1" }, ... } { "kind": "Event", "apiVersion": "audit.k8s.io/v1", "level": "RequestResponse", "auditID": "aed6caf9-5af0-4872-8f09-ad55974bb5e0", "stage": "ResponseComplete", "requestURI": "/api/v1/namespaces/security/secrets/mysql-admin", "verb": "get", "user": { "username": "system:serviceaccount:security:p.auster", "uid": "29ecb107-c0e8-4f2d-816a-b16f4391999c", "groups": [ "system:serviceaccounts", "system:serviceaccounts:security", "system:authenticated" ] }, ... "userAgent": "curl/7.64.0", "objectRef": { "resource": "secrets", "namespace": "security", "name": "mysql-admin", "apiVersion": "v1" }, ... } There we see that Secrets vault-token and mysql-admin were accessed by p.auster. Hence we change the passwords for those.

âžś echo new-vault-pass | base64 bmV3LXZhdWx0LXBhc3MK

âžś k -n security edit secret vault-token

âžś echo new-mysql-pass | base64 bmV3LW15c3FsLXBhc3MK

âžś k -n security edit secret mysql-admin Audit Logs ftw.

By running cat audit.log | grep "p.auster" | grep Secret | grep password we can see that passwords are stored in the Audit Logs, because they store the complete content of Secrets. It's never a good idea to reveal passwords in logs. In this case it would probably be sufficient to only store Metadata level information of Secrets which can be controlled via a Audit Policy.

Question 19 | Immutable Root FileSystem

Task weight: 2%

Use context: kubectl config use-context workload-prod

The Deployment immutable-deployment in Namespace team-purple should run immutable, it's created from file /opt/course/19/immutable-deployment.yaml. Even after a successful break-in, it shouldn't be possible for an attacker to modify the filesystem of the running container.

Modify the Deployment in a way that no processes inside the container can modify the local filesystem, only /tmp directory should be writeable. Don't modify the Docker image.

Save the updated YAML under /opt/course/19/immutable-deployment-new.yaml and update the running Deployment.

Answer:

Processes in containers can write to the local filesystem by default. This increases the attack surface when a non-malicious process gets hijacked. Preventing applications to write to disk or only allowing to certain directories can mitigate the risk. If there is for example a bug in Nginx which allows an attacker to override any file inside the container, then this only works if the Nginx process itself can write to the filesystem in the first place.

Making the root filesystem readonly can be done in the Docker image itself or in a Pod declaration.

Let us first check the Deployment immutable-deployment in Namespace team-purple:

âžś k -n team-purple edit deploy -o yaml
# kubectl -n team-purple edit deploy -o yaml
apiVersion: apps/v1
kind: Deployment
metadata:
  namespace: team-purple
  name: immutable-deployment
  labels:
    app: immutable-deployment
  ...
spec:
  replicas: 1
  selector:
    matchLabels:
      app: immutable-deployment
  template:
    metadata:
      labels:
        app: immutable-deployment
    spec:
      containers:
      - image: busybox:1.32.0
        command: ['sh', '-c', 'tail -f /dev/null']
        imagePullPolicy: IfNotPresent
        name: busybox
      restartPolicy: Always
...

The container has write access to the Root File System, as there are no restrictions defined for the Pods or containers by an existing SecurityContext. And based on the task we're not allowed to alter the Docker image.

So we modify the YAML manifest to include the required changes:

cp /opt/course/19/immutable-deployment.yaml /opt/course/19/immutable-deployment-new.yaml

vim /opt/course/19/immutable-deployment-new.yaml
# /opt/course/19/immutable-deployment-new.yaml
apiVersion: apps/v1
kind: Deployment
metadata:
  namespace: team-purple
  name: immutable-deployment
  labels:
    app: immutable-deployment
spec:
  replicas: 1
  selector:
    matchLabels:
      app: immutable-deployment
  template:
    metadata:
      labels:
        app: immutable-deployment
    spec:
      containers:
      - image: busybox:1.32.0
        command: ['sh', '-c', 'tail -f /dev/null']
        imagePullPolicy: IfNotPresent
        name: busybox
        securityContext:                  # add
          readOnlyRootFilesystem: true    # add
        volumeMounts:                     # add
        - mountPath: /tmp                 # add
          name: temp-vol                  # add
      volumes:                            # add
      - name: temp-vol                    # add
        emptyDir: {}                      # add
      restartPolicy: Always
      

SecurityContexts can be set on Pod or container level, here the latter was asked. Enforcing readOnlyRootFilesystem: true will render the root filesystem readonly. We can then allow some directories to be writable by using an emptyDir volume.

Once the changes are made, let us update the Deployment:

âžś k delete -f /opt/course/19/immutable-deployment-new.yaml
deployment.apps "immutable-deployment" deleted

âžś k create -f /opt/course/19/immutable-deployment-new.yaml
deployment.apps/immutable-deployment created

We can verify if the required changes are propagated:

âžś k -n team-purple exec immutable-deployment-5b7ff8d464-j2nrj -- touch /abc.txt
touch: /abc.txt: Read-only file system
command terminated with exit code 1

âžś k -n team-purple exec immutable-deployment-5b7ff8d464-j2nrj -- touch /var/abc.txt
touch: /var/abc.txt: Read-only file system
command terminated with exit code 1

âžś k -n team-purple exec immutable-deployment-5b7ff8d464-j2nrj -- touch /etc/abc.txt
touch: /etc/abc.txt: Read-only file system
command terminated with exit code 1

âžś k -n team-purple exec immutable-deployment-5b7ff8d464-j2nrj -- touch /tmp/abc.txt

âžś k -n team-purple exec immutable-deployment-5b7ff8d464-j2nrj -- ls /tmp
abc.txt

The Deployment has been updated so that the container's file system is read-only, and the updated YAML has been placed under the required location. Sweet!

Question 20 | Update Kubernetes

Task weight: 8%

Use context: kubectl config use-context workload-stage

The cluster is running Kubernetes 1.24.7, update it to 1.25.2.

Use apt package manager and kubeadm for this.

Use ssh cluster3-controlplane1 and ssh cluster3-node1 to connect to the instances.

Answer:

Let's have a look at the current versions:

âžś k get node
NAME                     STATUS   ROLES           AGE   VERSION
cluster3-controlplane1   Ready    control-plane   21d   v1.24.7
cluster3-node1           Ready    <none>          21d   v1.24.7
Control Plane Master Components

First we should update the control plane components running on the master node, so we drain it:

âžś k drain cluster3-controlplane1 --ignore-daemonsets
Next we ssh into it and check versions:

âžś ssh cluster3-controlplane1

âžś root@cluster3-controlplane1:~# kubeadm version
kubeadm version: &version.Info{Major:"1", Minor:"24", GitVersion:"v1.24.1", GitCommit:"3ddd0f45aa91e2f30c70734b175631bec5b5825a", GitTreeState:"clean", BuildDate:"2022-05-24T12:24:38Z", GoVersion:"go1.18.2", Compiler:"gc", Platform:"linux/amd64"}

âžś root@cluster3-controlplane1:~# kubelet --version
Kubernetes v1.23.1

We see kubeadm is already installed in the required version. Else we would need to install it:

# not necessary because here kubeadm is already installed in correct version
apt-mark unhold kubeadm
apt-mark hold kubectl kubelet
apt install kubeadm=1.24.1-00
apt-mark hold kubeadm

Check what kubeadm has available as an upgrade plan:

âžś root@cluster3-controlplane1:~# kubeadm upgrade plan
...
[upgrade/config] Making sure the configuration is correct:
[upgrade/config] Reading configuration from the cluster...
[upgrade/config] FYI: You can look at this config file with 'kubectl -n kube-system get cm kubeadm-config -o yaml'
W0804 11:13:33.017862   32724 initconfiguration.go:120] Usage of CRI endpoints without URL scheme is deprecated and can cause kubelet errors in the future. Automatically prepending scheme "unix" to the "criSocket" with value "/run/containerd/containerd.sock". Please update your configuration!
[preflight] Running pre-flight checks.
[upgrade] Running cluster health checks
[upgrade] Fetching available versions to upgrade to
[upgrade/versions] Cluster version: v1.23.1
[upgrade/versions] kubeadm version: v1.24.1
[upgrade/versions] Target version: v1.24.3
[upgrade/versions] Latest version in the v1.23 series: v1.23.9

...

You can now apply the upgrade by executing the following command:

        kubeadm upgrade apply v1.24.3

Note: Before you can perform this upgrade, you have to update kubeadm to v1.24.3.
...

And we apply to the required version:

âžś root@cluster3-controlplane1:~# kubeadm upgrade apply v1.24.1
[upgrade/config] Making sure the configuration is correct:
[upgrade/config] Reading configuration from the cluster...
[upgrade/config] FYI: You can look at this config file with 'kubectl -n kube-system get cm kubeadm-config -o yaml'
W0804 11:15:35.345360   32762 initconfiguration.go:120] Usage of CRI endpoints without URL scheme is deprecated and can cause kubelet errors in the future. Automatically prepending scheme "unix" to the "criSocket" with value "/run/containerd/containerd.sock". Please update your configuration!
[preflight] Running pre-flight checks.
[upgrade] Running cluster health checks
[upgrade/version] You have chosen to change the cluster version to "v1.24.1"
[upgrade/versions] Cluster version: v1.23.1
[upgrade/versions] kubeadm version: v1.24.1
[upgrade/confirm] Are you sure you want to proceed with the upgrade? [y/N]: y
[upgrade/prepull] Pulling images required for setting up a Kubernetes cluster
....

[upgrade/successful] SUCCESS! Your cluster was upgraded to "v1.24.1". Enjoy!

Next we can check if our required version was installed correctly:

âžś root@cluster3-controlplane1:~# kubeadm upgrade plan
[upgrade/config] Making sure the configuration is correct:
[upgrade/config] Reading configuration from the cluster...
[upgrade/config] FYI: You can look at this config file with 'kubectl -n kube-system get cm kubeadm-config -o yaml'
[preflight] Running pre-flight checks.
[upgrade] Running cluster health checks
[upgrade] Fetching available versions to upgrade to
[upgrade/versions] Cluster version: v1.24.1
[upgrade/versions] kubeadm version: v1.24.1
[upgrade/versions] Target version: v1.24.3
[upgrade/versions] Latest version in the v1.24 series: v1.24.3

...
Control Plane kubelet and kubectl
âžś root@cluster3-controlplane1:~# apt update
Hit:1 http://ppa.launchpad.net/rmescandon/yq/ubuntu focal InRelease
Hit:3 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu bionic InRelease                 
Hit:2 https://packages.cloud.google.com/apt kubernetes-xenial InRelease
Reading package lists... Done                             
Building dependency tree       
Reading state information... Done

âžś root@cluster3-controlplane1:~# apt-mark unhold kubelet kubectl
kubelet was already not hold.
kubectl was already not hold.

âžś root@cluster3-controlplane1:~# apt install kubelet=1.24.1-00 kubectl=1.24.1-00
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree       
Reading state information... Done
The following packages will be upgraded:
  kubectl kubelet
2 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 1 not upgraded.
Need to get 28.6 MB of archives.
After this operation, 9,044 kB disk space will be freed.
Get:1 https://packages.cloud.google.com/apt kubernetes-xenial/main amd64 kubectl amd64 1.24.1-00 [9,318 kB]
Get:2 https://packages.cloud.google.com/apt kubernetes-xenial/main amd64 kubelet amd64 1.24.1-00 [19.3 MB]
Fetched 28.6 MB in 2s (12.8 MB/s)  
(Reading database ... 112511 files and directories currently installed.)
Preparing to unpack .../kubectl_1.24.1-00_amd64.deb ...
Unpacking kubectl (1.24.1-00) over (1.23.1-00) ...
Preparing to unpack .../kubelet_1.24.1-00_amd64.deb ...
Unpacking kubelet (1.24.1-00) over (1.23.1-00) ...
Setting up kubectl (1.24.1-00) ...
Setting up kubelet (1.24.1-00) ...

âžś root@cluster3-controlplane1:~# apt-mark hold kubelet kubectl
kubelet set on hold.
kubectl set on hold.

âžś root@cluster3-controlplane1:~# service kubelet restart

âžś root@cluster3-controlplane1:~# service kubelet status
â—Ź kubelet.service - kubelet: The Kubernetes Node Agent
     Loaded: loaded (/lib/systemd/system/kubelet.service; enabled; vendor preset: enabled)
    Drop-In: /etc/systemd/system/kubelet.service.d
             └─10-kubeadm.conf
     Active: active (running) since Sun 2022-02-06 15:32:36 UTC; 8s ago

âžś root@cluster3-controlplane1:~# kubectl get node
NAME                     STATUS                     ROLES           AGE   VERSION
cluster3-controlplane1   Ready,SchedulingDisabled   control-plane   21d   v1.24.1
cluster3-node1           Ready                      <none>          21d   v1.23.1

Done, and uncordon:

âžś k uncordon cluster3-controlplane1
node/cluster3-controlplane1 uncordoned
Data Plane
âžś k get node
NAME                     STATUS   ROLES           AGE   VERSION
cluster3-controlplane1   Ready    control-plane   21d   v1.24.1
cluster3-node1           Ready    <none>          21d   v1.23.1

Our data plane consist of one single worker node, so let's update it. First thing is we should drain it:

k drain cluster3-node1 --ignore-daemonsets

Next we ssh into it and upgrade kubeadm to the wanted version, or check if already done:

âžś ssh cluster3-node1

âžś root@cluster3-node1:~# apt update
Hit:1 http://ppa.launchpad.net/rmescandon/yq/ubuntu focal InRelease
Hit:3 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu bionic InRelease  
Hit:2 https://packages.cloud.google.com/apt kubernetes-xenial InRelease
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree       
Reading state information... Done

âžś root@cluster3-node1:~# apt-mark unhold kubeadm
kubeadm was already not hold.

âžś root@cluster3-node1:~# apt-mark hold kubectl kubelet
kubectl set on hold.
kubelet set on hold.

âžś root@cluster3-node1:~# apt install kubeadm=1.24.1-00
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree       
Reading state information... Done
The following packages will be upgraded:
  kubeadm
1 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 2 not upgraded.
Need to get 9,000 kB of archives.
After this operation, 844 kB disk space will be freed.
Get:1 https://packages.cloud.google.com/apt kubernetes-xenial/main amd64 kubeadm amd64 1.24.1-00 [9,000 kB]
Fetched 9,000 kB in 1s (6,250 kB/s)  
(Reading database ... 112511 files and directories currently installed.)
Preparing to unpack .../kubeadm_1.24.1-00_amd64.deb ...
Unpacking kubeadm (1.24.1-00) over (1.23.1-00) ...
Setting up kubeadm (1.24.1-00) ...

âžś root@cluster3-node1:~# apt-mark hold kubeadm
kubeadm set on hold.

âžś root@cluster3-node1:~# kubeadm upgrade node
[upgrade] Reading configuration from the cluster...
[upgrade] FYI: You can look at this config file with 'kubectl -n kube-system get cm kubeadm-config -o yaml'
[preflight] Running pre-flight checks
[preflight] Skipping prepull. Not a control plane node.
[upgrade] Skipping phase. Not a control plane node.
[kubelet-start] Writing kubelet configuration to file "/var/lib/kubelet/config.yaml"
[upgrade] The configuration for this node was successfully updated!
[upgrade] Now you should go ahead and upgrade the kubelet package using your package manager.

Now we follow that kubeadm told us in the last line and upgrade kubelet (and kubectl):

âžś root@cluster3-node1:~# apt-mark unhold kubectl kubelet
Canceled hold on kubectl.
Canceled hold on kubelet.

âžś root@cluster3-node1:~# apt install kubelet=1.24.1-00 kubectl=1.24.1-00
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree       
Reading state information... Done
The following packages will be upgraded:
  kubectl kubelet
2 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 1 not upgraded.
Need to get 28.6 MB of archives.
After this operation, 9,044 kB disk space will be freed.
Get:1 https://packages.cloud.google.com/apt kubernetes-xenial/main amd64 kubectl amd64 1.24.1-00 [9,318 kB]
Get:2 https://packages.cloud.google.com/apt kubernetes-xenial/main amd64 kubelet amd64 1.24.1-00 [19.3 MB]
Fetched 28.6 MB in 1s (24.0 MB/s)  
(Reading database ... 112511 files and directories currently installed.)
Preparing to unpack .../kubectl_1.24.1-00_amd64.deb ...
Unpacking kubectl (1.24.1-00) over (1.23.1-00) ...
Preparing to unpack .../kubelet_1.24.1-00_amd64.deb ...
Unpacking kubelet (1.24.1-00) over (1.23.1-00) ...
Setting up kubectl (1.24.1-00) ...
Setting up kubelet (1.24.1-00) ...

âžś root@cluster3-node1:~# service kubelet restart

âžś root@cluster3-node1:~# service kubelet status
â—Ź kubelet.service - kubelet: The Kubernetes Node Agent
     Loaded: loaded (/lib/systemd/system/kubelet.service; enabled; vendor preset: enabled)
    Drop-In: /etc/systemd/system/kubelet.service.d
             └─10-kubeadm.conf
     Active: active (running) since Sun 2022-02-06 15:38:10 UTC; 3s ago
     

Looking good, what does the node status say?

âžś k get node
NAME                     STATUS                     ROLES           AGE   VERSION
cluster3-controlplane1   Ready                      control-plane   21d   v1.24.1
cluster3-node1           Ready,SchedulingDisabled   <none>          21d   v1.24.1

Beautiful, let's make it schedulable again:

âžś k uncordon cluster3-node1
node/cluster3-node1 uncordoned

âžś k get node
NAME                     STATUS   ROLES           AGE   VERSION
cluster3-controlplane1   Ready    control-plane   21d   v1.24.1
cluster3-node1           Ready    <none>          21d   v1.24.1

We're up to date.

Question 21 | Image Vulnerability Scanning

Task weight: 2%

(can be solved in any kubectl context)

The Vulnerability Scanner trivy is installed on your main terminal. Use it to scan the following images for known CVEs:

  • nginx:1.16.1-alpine
  • k8s.gcr.io/kube-apiserver:v1.18.0
  • k8s.gcr.io/kube-controller-manager:v1.18.0
  • docker.io/weaveworks/weave-kube:2.7.0

Write all images that don't contain the vulnerabilities CVE-2020-10878 or CVE-2020-1967 into /opt/course/21/good-images.

Answer:

The tool trivy is very simple to use, it compares images against public databases.

âžś trivy nginx:1.16.1-alpine
2020-10-09T20:59:39.198Z        INFO    Need to update DB
2020-10-09T20:59:39.198Z        INFO    Downloading DB...
18.81 MiB / 18.81 MiB [-------------------------------------
2020-10-09T20:59:45.499Z        INFO    Detecting Alpine vulnerabilities...

nginx:1.16.1-alpine (alpine 3.10.4)
===================================
Total: 7 (UNKNOWN: 0, LOW: 0, MEDIUM: 7, HIGH: 0, CRITICAL: 0)

+---------------+------------------+----------+-------------------
|    LIBRARY    | VULNERABILITY ID | SEVERITY | INSTALLED VERSION
+---------------+------------------+----------+-------------------
| libcrypto1.1  | CVE-2020-1967    | MEDIUM   | 1.1.1d-r2         
... 

To solve the task we can run:

âžś trivy nginx:1.16.1-alpine | grep -E 'CVE-2020-10878|CVE-2020-1967'
| libcrypto1.1  | CVE-2020-1967    | MEDIUM   
| libssl1.1     | CVE-2020-1967    |          

âžś trivy k8s.gcr.io/kube-apiserver:v1.18.0 | grep -E 'CVE-2020-10878|CVE-2020-1967'
| perl-base     | CVE-2020-10878      | HIGH

âžś trivy k8s.gcr.io/kube-controller-manager:v1.18.0 | grep -E 'CVE-2020-10878|CVE-2020-1967'
| perl-base     | CVE-2020-10878      | HIGH   

âžś trivy docker.io/weaveworks/weave-kube:2.7.0 | grep -E 'CVE-2020-10878|CVE-2020-1967'
âžś

The only image without the any of the two CVEs is docker.io/weaveworks/weave-kube:2.7.0, hence our answer will be:

# /opt/course/21/good-images
docker.io/weaveworks/weave-kube:2.7.0

Question 22 | Manual Static Security Analysis

Task weight: 3%

(can be solved in any kubectl context)

The Release Engineering Team has shared some YAML manifests and Dockerfiles with you to review. The files are located under /opt/course/22/files.

As a container security expert, you are asked to perform a manual static analysis and find out possible security issues with respect to unwanted credential exposure. Running processes as root is of no concern in this task.

Write the filenames which have issues into /opt/course/22/security-issues.

NOTE: In the Dockerfile and YAML manifests, assume that the referred files, folders, secrets and volume mounts are present. Disregard syntax or logic errors.

Answer:

We check location /opt/course/22/files and list the files.

âžś ls -la /opt/course/22/files
total 48
drwxr-xr-x 2 k8s k8s 4096 Sep 16 19:08 .
drwxr-xr-x 3 k8s k8s 4096 Sep 16 19:08 ..
-rw-r--r-- 1 k8s k8s  692 Sep 16 19:08 Dockerfile-go
-rw-r--r-- 1 k8s k8s  897 Sep 16 19:08 Dockerfile-mysql
-rw-r--r-- 1 k8s k8s  743 Sep 16 19:08 Dockerfile-py
-rw-r--r-- 1 k8s k8s  341 Sep 16 19:08 deployment-nginx.yaml
-rw-r--r-- 1 k8s k8s  705 Sep 16 19:08 deployment-redis.yaml
-rw-r--r-- 1 k8s k8s  392 Sep 16 19:08 pod-nginx.yaml
-rw-r--r-- 1 k8s k8s  228 Sep 16 19:08 pv-manual.yaml
-rw-r--r-- 1 k8s k8s  188 Sep 16 19:08 pvc-manual.yaml
-rw-r--r-- 1 k8s k8s  211 Sep 16 19:08 sc-local.yaml
-rw-r--r-- 1 k8s k8s  902 Sep 16 19:08 statefulset-nginx.yaml

We have 3 Dockerfiles and 7 Kubernetes Resource YAML manifests. Next we should go over each to find security issues with the way credentials have been used.

NOTE: You should be comfortable with Docker Best Practices and the Kubernetes Configuration Best Practices.

While navigating through the files we might notice:

Number 1

File Dockerfile-mysql might look innocent on first look. It copies a file secret-token over, uses it and deletes it afterwards. But because of the way Docker works, every RUN, COPY and ADD command creates a new layer and every layer is persistet in the image.

This means even if the file secret-token get's deleted in layer Z, it's still included with the image in layer X and Y. In this case it would be better to use for example variables passed to Docker.

# /opt/course/22/files/Dockerfile-mysql
FROM ubuntu

# Add MySQL configuration
COPY my.cnf /etc/mysql/conf.d/my.cnf
COPY mysqld_charset.cnf /etc/mysql/conf.d/mysqld_charset.cnf

RUN apt-get update && \
    apt-get -yq install mysql-server-5.6 &&

# Add MySQL scripts
COPY import_sql.sh /import_sql.sh
COPY run.sh /run.sh

# Configure credentials
COPY secret-token .                                       # LAYER X
RUN /etc/register.sh ./secret-token                       # LAYER Y
RUN rm ./secret-token # delete secret token again         # LATER Z

EXPOSE 3306
CMD ["/run.sh"]

So we do:

echo Dockerfile-mysql >> /opt/course/22/security-issues
Number 2

The file deployment-redis.yaml is fetching credentials from a Secret named mysecret and writes these into environment variables. So far so good, but in the command of the container it's echoing these which can be directly read by any user having access to the logs.

# /opt/course/22/files/deployment-redis.yaml
apiVersion: apps/v1
kind: Deployment
metadata:
  name: nginx-deployment
  labels:
    app: nginx
spec:
  replicas: 3
  selector:
    matchLabels:
      app: nginx
  template:
    metadata:
      labels:
        app: nginx
    spec:
      containers:
      - name: mycontainer
        image: redis
        command: ["/bin/sh"]
        args:
        - "-c"
        - "echo $SECRET_USERNAME && echo $SECRET_PASSWORD && docker-entrypoint.sh" # NOT GOOD
        env:
        - name: SECRET_USERNAME
          valueFrom:
            secretKeyRef:
              name: mysecret
              key: username
        - name: SECRET_PASSWORD
          valueFrom:
            secretKeyRef:
              name: mysecret
              key: password

Credentials in logs is never a good idea, hence we do:

echo deployment-redis.yaml >> /opt/course/22/security-issues
Number 3

In file statefulset-nginx.yaml, the password is directly exposed in the environment variable definition of the container.

# /opt/course/22/files/statefulset-nginx.yaml
...
apiVersion: apps/v1
kind: StatefulSet
metadata:
  name: web
spec:
  serviceName: "nginx"
  replicas: 2
  selector:
    matchLabels:
      app: nginx
  template:
    metadata:
      labels:
        app: nginx
    spec:
      containers:
      - name: nginx
        image: k8s.gcr.io/nginx-slim:0.8
        env:
        - name: Username
          value: Administrator
        - name: Password
          value: MyDiReCtP@sSw0rd               # NOT GOOD
        ports:
        - containerPort: 80
          name: web
..

This should better be injected via a Secret. So we do:

echo statefulset-nginx.yaml >> /opt/course/22/security-issues
âžś cat /opt/course/22/security-issues
Dockerfile-mysql
deployment-redis.yaml
statefulset-nginx.yaml

CKS Simulator Preview Kubernetes 1.25

https://killer.sh

This is a preview of the full CKS Simulator course content.

The full course contains 22 questions and scenarios which cover all the CKS areas. The course also provides a browser terminal which is a very close replica of the original one. This is great to get used and comfortable before the real exam. After the test session (120 minutes), or if you stop it early, you'll get access to all questions and their detailed solutions. You'll have 36 hours cluster access in total which means even after the session, once you have the solutions, you can still play around.

The following preview will give you an idea of what the full course will provide. These preview questions are not part of the 22 in the full course but in addition to it. But the preview questions are part of the same CKS simulation environment which we setup for you, so with access to the full course you can solve these too.

The answers provided here assume that you did run the initial terminal setup suggestions as provided in the tips section, but especially:

alias k=kubectl

export do="-o yaml --dry-run=client"

These questions can be solved in the test environment provided through the CKS Simulator

Preview Question 1

Use context: kubectl config use-context infra-prod

You have admin access to cluster2. There is also context gianna@infra-prod which authenticates as user gianna with the same cluster.

There are existing cluster-level RBAC resources in place to, among other things, ensure that user gianna can never read Secret contents cluster-wide. Confirm this is correct or restrict the existing RBAC resources to ensure this.

I addition, create more RBAC resources to allow user gianna to create Pods and Deployments in Namespaces security, restricted and internal. It's likely the user will receive these exact permissions as well for other Namespaces in the future.

Answer:

Part 1 - check existing RBAC rules

We should probably first have a look at the existing RBAC resources for user gianna. We don't know the resource names but we know these are cluster-level so we can search for a ClusterRoleBinding:

k get clusterrolebinding -oyaml | grep gianna -A10 -B20

From this we see the binding is also called gianna:

k edit clusterrolebinding gianna
# kubectl edit clusterrolebinding gianna
apiVersion: rbac.authorization.k8s.io/v1
kind: ClusterRoleBinding
metadata:
  creationTimestamp: "2020-09-26T13:57:58Z"
  name: gianna
  resourceVersion: "3049"
  selfLink: /apis/rbac.authorization.k8s.io/v1/clusterrolebindings/gianna
  uid: 72b64a3b-5958-4cf8-8078-e5be2c55b25d
roleRef:
  apiGroup: rbac.authorization.k8s.io
  kind: ClusterRole
  name: gianna
subjects:
- apiGroup: rbac.authorization.k8s.io
  kind: User
  name: gianna

It links user gianna to same named ClusterRole:

k edit clusterrole gianna
apiVersion: rbac.authorization.k8s.io/v1
kind: ClusterRole
metadata:
  creationTimestamp: "2020-09-26T13:57:55Z"
  name: gianna
  resourceVersion: "3038"
  selfLink: /apis/rbac.authorization.k8s.io/v1/clusterroles/gianna
  uid: b713c1cf-87e5-4313-808e-1a51f392adc0
rules:
- apiGroups:
  - ""
  resources:
  - secrets
  - configmaps
  - pods
  - namespaces
  verbs:
  - list

According to the task the user should never be able to read Secrets content. They verb list might indicate on first look that this is correct. We can also check using K8s User Impersonation:

âžś k auth can-i list secrets --as gianna
yes

âžś k auth can-i get secrets --as gianna
no

But let's have a closer look:

âžś k config use-context gianna@infra-prod
Switched to context "gianna@infra-prod".

âžś k -n security get secrets
NAME                  TYPE                                  DATA   AGE
default-token-gn455   kubernetes.io/service-account-token   3      20m
kubeadmin-token       Opaque                                1      20m
mysql-admin           Opaque                                1      20m
postgres001           Opaque                                1      20m
postgres002           Opaque                                1      20m
vault-token           Opaque                                1      20m

âžś k -n security get secret kubeadmin-token
Error from server (Forbidden): secrets "kubeadmin-token" is forbidden: User "gianna" cannot get resource "secrets" in API group "" in the namespace "security"

Still all expected, but being able to list resources also allows to specify the format:

âžś k -n security get secrets -oyaml | grep password
    password: ekhHYW5lQUVTaVVxCg==
        {"apiVersion":"v1","data":{"password":"ekhHYW5lQUVTaVVxCg=="},"kind":"Secret","metadata":{"annotations":{},"name":"kubeadmin-token","namespace":"security"},"type":"Opaque"}
          f:password: {}
    password: bWdFVlBSdEpEWHBFCg==
...

The user gianna is actually able to read Secret content. To prevent this we should remove the ability to list these:

k config use-context infra-prod # back to admin context

k edit clusterrole gianna
# kubectl edit clusterrole gianna
apiVersion: rbac.authorization.k8s.io/v1
kind: ClusterRole
metadata:
  creationTimestamp: "2020-09-26T13:57:55Z"
  name: gianna
  resourceVersion: "4496"
  selfLink: /apis/rbac.authorization.k8s.io/v1/clusterroles/gianna
  uid: b713c1cf-87e5-4313-808e-1a51f392adc0
rules:
- apiGroups:
  - ""
  resources:
#  - secrets       # remove
  - configmaps
  - pods
  - namespaces
  verbs:
  - list
Part 2 - create additional RBAC rules

Let's talk a little about RBAC resources:

A ClusterRole|Role defines a set of permissions and where it is available, in the whole cluster or just a single Namespace.

A ClusterRoleBinding|RoleBinding connects a set of permissions with an account and defines where it is applied, in the whole cluster or just a single Namespace.

Because of this there are 4 different RBAC combinations and 3 valid ones:

  • Role + RoleBinding (available in single Namespace, applied in single Namespace)
  • ClusterRole + ClusterRoleBinding (available cluster-wide, applied cluster-wide)
  • ClusterRole + RoleBinding (available cluster-wide, applied in single Namespace)
  • Role + ClusterRoleBinding (NOT POSSIBLE: available in single Namespace, applied cluster-wide)

The user gianna should be able to create Pods and Deployments in three Namespaces. We can use number 1 or 3 from the list above. But because the task says: "The user might receive these exact permissions as well for other Namespaces in the future", we choose number 3 as it requires to only create one ClusterRole instead of three Roles.

k create clusterrole gianna-additional --verb=create --resource=pods --resource=deployments

This will create a ClusterRole like:

# kubectl create clusterrole gianna-additional --verb=create --resource=pods --resource=deployments
apiVersion: rbac.authorization.k8s.io/v1
kind: ClusterRole
metadata:
  creationTimestamp: null
  name: gianna-additional
rules:
- apiGroups:
  - ""
  resources:
  - pods
  verbs:
  - create
- apiGroups:
  - apps
  resources:
  - deployments
  verbs:
  - create

Next the three bindings:

k -n security create rolebinding gianna-additional \
--clusterrole=gianna-additional --user=gianna

k -n restricted create rolebinding gianna-additional \
--clusterrole=gianna-additional --user=gianna

k -n internal create rolebinding gianna-additional \
--clusterrole=gianna-additional --user=gianna

Which will create RoleBindings like:

# k -n security create rolebinding gianna-additional --clusterrole=gianna-additional --user=gianna
apiVersion: rbac.authorization.k8s.io/v1
kind: RoleBinding
metadata:
  creationTimestamp: null
  name: gianna-additional
  namespace: security
roleRef:
  apiGroup: rbac.authorization.k8s.io
  kind: ClusterRole
  name: gianna-additional
subjects:
- apiGroup: rbac.authorization.k8s.io
  kind: User
  name: gianna
And we test:
âžś k -n default auth can-i create pods --as gianna
no

âžś k -n security auth can-i create pods --as gianna
yes

âžś k -n restricted auth can-i create pods --as gianna
yes

âžś k -n internal auth can-i create pods --as gianna
yes

Feel free to verify this as well by actually creating Pods and Deployments as user gianna through context gianna@infra-prod.

Preview Question 2

Use context: kubectl config use-context infra-prod

There is an existing Open Policy Agent + Gatekeeper policy to enforce that all Namespaces need to have label security-level set. Extend the policy constraint and template so that all Namespaces also need to set label management-team. Any new Namespace creation without these two labels should be prevented.

Write the names of all existing Namespaces which violate the updated policy into /opt/course/p2/fix-namespaces.

Answer:

We look at existing OPA constraints, these are implemeted using CRDs by Gatekeeper:

âžś k get crd
NAME                                                 CREATED AT
blacklistimages.constraints.gatekeeper.sh            2020-09-14T19:29:31Z
configs.config.gatekeeper.sh                         2020-09-14T19:29:04Z
constraintpodstatuses.status.gatekeeper.sh           2020-09-14T19:29:05Z
constrainttemplatepodstatuses.status.gatekeeper.sh   2020-09-14T19:29:05Z
constrainttemplates.templates.gatekeeper.sh          2020-09-14T19:29:05Z
requiredlabels.constraints.gatekeeper.sh             2020-09-14T19:29:31Z

So we can do:

âžś k get constraint
NAME                                                           AGE
blacklistimages.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/pod-trusted-images   10m

NAME                                                                  AGE
requiredlabels.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/namespace-mandatory-labels   10m

And check violations for the namespace-mandatory-label one, which we can do in the resource status:

âžś k describe requiredlabels namespace-mandatory-labels
Name:         namespace-mandatory-labels
Namespace:    
Labels:       <none>
Annotations:  <none>
API Version:  constraints.gatekeeper.sh/v1beta1
Kind:         RequiredLabels
...
Status:
...
  Total Violations:  1
  Violations:
    Enforcement Action:  deny
    Kind:                Namespace
    Message:             you must provide labels: {"security-level"}
    Name:                sidecar-injector
Events:  

We see one violation for Namespace "sidecar-injector". Let's get an overview over all Namespaces:

âžś k get ns --show-labels
NAME                STATUS   AGE   LABELS
default             Active   21m   management-team=green,security-level=high
gatekeeper-system   Active   14m   admission.gatekeeper.sh/ignore=no-self-managing,control-plane=controller-manager,gatekeeper.sh/system=yes,management-team=green,security-level=high
jeffs-playground    Active   14m   security-level=high
kube-node-lease     Active   21m   management-team=green,security-level=high
kube-public         Active   21m   management-team=red,security-level=low
kube-system         Active   21m   management-team=green,security-level=high
restricted          Active   14m   management-team=blue,security-level=medium
security            Active   14m   management-team=blue,security-level=medium
sidecar-injector    Active   14m   <none>

When we try to create a Namespace without the required label we get an OPA error:

âžś k create ns test
Error from server ([denied by namespace-mandatory-labels] you must provide labels: {"security-level"}): error when creating "ns.yaml": admission webhook "validation.gatekeeper.sh" denied the request: [denied by namespace-mandatory-labels] you must provide labels: {"security-level"}

Next we edit the constraint to add another required label:

k edit requiredlabels namespace-mandatory-labels
# kubectl edit requiredlabels namespace-mandatory-labels
apiVersion: constraints.gatekeeper.sh/v1beta1
kind: RequiredLabels
metadata:
  annotations:
    kubectl.kubernetes.io/last-applied-configuration: |
      {"apiVersion":"constraints.gatekeeper.sh/v1beta1","kind":"RequiredLabels","metadata":{"annotations":{},"name":"namespace-mandatory-labels"},"spec":{"match":{"kinds":[{"apiGroups":[""],"kinds":["Namespace"]}]},"parameters":{"labels":["security-level"]}}}
  creationTimestamp: "2020-09-14T19:29:53Z"
  generation: 1
  name: namespace-mandatory-labels
  resourceVersion: "3081"
  selfLink: /apis/constraints.gatekeeper.sh/v1beta1/requiredlabels/namespace-mandatory-labels
  uid: 2a51a291-e07f-4bab-b33c-9b8c90e5125b
spec:
  match:
    kinds:
    - apiGroups:
      - ""
      kinds:
      - Namespace
  parameters:
    labels:
    - security-level
    - management-team # add

As we can see the constraint is using kind: RequiredLabels as template, which is a CRD created by Gatekeeper. Let's apply the change and see what happens (give OPA a minute to apply the changes internally):

âžś k describe requiredlabels namespace-mandatory-labels
...
  Violations:
    Enforcement Action:  deny
    Kind:                Namespace
    Message:             you must provide labels: {"management-team"}
    Name:                jeffs-playground

After the changes we can see that now another Namespace jeffs-playground is in trouble. Because that one only specifies one required label. But what about the earlier violation of Namespace sidecar-injector?

âžś k get ns --show-labels
NAME                STATUS   AGE   LABELS
default             Active   21m   management-team=green,security-level=high
gatekeeper-system   Active   17m   admission.gatekeeper.sh/ignore=no-self-managing,control-plane=controller-manager,gatekeeper.sh/system=yes,management-team=green,security-level=high
jeffs-playground    Active   17m   security-level=high
kube-node-lease     Active   21m   management-team=green,security-level=high
kube-public         Active   21m   management-team=red,security-level=low
kube-system         Active   21m   management-team=green,security-level=high
restricted          Active   17m   management-team=blue,security-level=medium
security            Active   17m   management-team=blue,security-level=medium
sidecar-injector    Active   17m   <none>

Namespace sidecar-injector should also be in trouble, but it isn't any longer. This doesn't seem right, it means we could still create Namespaces without any labels just like using k create ns test.

So we check the template:

âžś k get constrainttemplates
NAME              AGE
blacklistimages   20m
requiredlabels    20m

âžś k edit constrainttemplates requiredlabels
# kubectl edit constrainttemplates requiredlabels
apiVersion: templates.gatekeeper.sh/v1beta1
kind: ConstraintTemplate
...
spec:
  crd:
    spec:
      names:
        kind: RequiredLabels
      validation:
        openAPIV3Schema:
          properties:
            labels:
              items: string
              type: array
  targets:
  - rego: |
      package k8srequiredlabels

      violation[{"msg": msg, "details": {"missing_labels": missing}}] {
        provided := {label | input.review.object.metadata.labels[label]}
        required := {label | label := input.parameters.labels[_]}
        missing := required - provided
        # count(missing) == 1 # WRONG
        count(missing) > 0
        msg := sprintf("you must provide labels: %v", [missing])
      }
    target: admission.k8s.gatekeeper.sh

In the rego script we need to change count(missing) == 1 to count(missing) > 0 . If we don't do this then the policy only complains if there is one missing label, but there can be multiple missing ones.

After waiting a bit we check the constraint again:

âžś k describe requiredlabels namespace-mandatory-labels
...
  Total Violations:  2
  Violations:
    Enforcement Action:  deny
    Kind:                Namespace
    Message:             you must provide labels: {"management-team"}
    Name:                jeffs-playground
    Enforcement Action:  deny
    Kind:                Namespace
    Message:             you must provide labels: {"security-level", "management-team"}
    Name:                sidecar-injector
Events:                  <none>

This looks better. Finally we write the Namespace names with violations into the required location:

# /opt/course/p2/fix-namespaces
sidecar-injector
jeffs-playground

Preview Question 3

Use context: kubectl config use-context workload-stage

A security scan result shows that there is an unknown miner process running on one of the Nodes in cluster3. The report states that the process is listening on port 6666. Kill the process and delete the binary.

Answer:

We have a look at existing Nodes:

âžś k get node
NAME                     STATUS   ROLES           AGE    VERSION
cluster3-controlplane1   Ready    control-plane   109m   v1.24.7
cluster3-node1           Ready    <none>          105m   v1.24.7

First we check the master:

âžś ssh cluster3-controlplane1

âžś root@cluster3-controlplane1:~# netstat -plnt | grep 6666

âžś root@cluster3-controlplane1:~# 

Doesn't look like any process listening on this port. So we check the worker:

âžś ssh cluster3-node1

âžś root@cluster3-node1:~# netstat -plnt | grep 6666
tcp6       0      0 :::6666                 :::*        LISTEN      9591/system-atm    

There we go! We could also use lsof:

âžś root@cluster3-node1:~# lsof -i :6666
COMMAND    PID USER   FD   TYPE DEVICE SIZE/OFF NODE NAME
system-at 9591 root    3u  IPv6  47760      0t0  TCP *:6666 (LISTEN)

Before we kill the process we can check the magic /proc directory for the full process path:

âžś root@cluster3-node1:~# ls -lh /proc/9591/exe
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 0 Sep 26 16:10 /proc/9591/exe -> /bin/system-atm

So we finish it:

âžś root@cluster3-node1:~# kill -9 9591

âžś root@cluster3-node1:~# rm /bin/system-atm

Done.

CKS Tips Kubernetes 1.25

In this section we'll provide some tips on how to handle the CKS exam and browser terminal.

Knowledge

Pre-Knowledge

You should have your CKA knowledge up to date and be fast with kubectl, so we suggest to do:

Knowledge

Approach

  • Do 1 or 2 test session with this CKS Simulator. Understand the solutions and maybe try out other ways to achieve the same thing.
  • Setup your aliases, be fast and breath kubectl

Content

Be comfortable with changing the kube-apiserver in a kubeadm setup Be able to work with AdmissionControllers Know how to create and use the ImagePolicyWebhook Know how to use opensource tools Falco, Sysdig, Tracee, Trivy

CKS Exam Info

Read the Curriculum

https://github.com/cncf/curriculum

Read the Handbook

https://docs.linuxfoundation.org/tc-docs/certification/lf-handbook1

Read the important tips

https://docs.linuxfoundation.org/tc-docs/certification/important-instructions-cks

Read the FAQ

https://docs.linuxfoundation.org/tc-docs/certification/faq-cka-ckad-cks

Kubernetes documentation

Get familiar with the Kubernetes documentation and be able to use the search. Allowed links are:

NOTE: Verify the list here

CKS clusters

In the CKS exam you'll get access to as many clusters as you have questions, each will be solved in its own cluster. This is great because you cannot interfere with other tasks by breaking one. Every cluster will have one master and one worker node.

The Test Environment / Browser Terminal

You'll be provided with a browser terminal which uses Ubuntu 20. The standard shells included with a minimal install of Ubuntu 20 will be available, including bash.

Laggin

There could be some lagging, definitely make sure you are using a good internet connection because your webcam and screen are uploading all the time.

Kubectl autocompletion and commands

Autocompletion is configured by default, as well as the k alias source and others:

kubectl with k alias and Bash autocompletion

yq and jq for YAML/JSON processing

tmux for terminal multiplexing

curl and wget for testing web services

man and man pages for further documentation

Copy & Paste

There could be issues copying text (like pod names) from the left task information into the terminal. Some suggested to "hard" hit or long hold Cmd/Ctrl+C a few times to take action. Apart from that copy and paste should just work like in normal terminals.

Percentages and Score

There are 15-20 questions in the exam and 100% of total percentage to reach. Each questions shows the % it gives if you solve it. Your results will be automatically checked according to the handbook. If you don't agree with the results you can request a review by contacting the Linux Foundation support.

Notepad & Skipping Questions

You have access to a simple notepad in the browser which can be used for storing any kind of plain text. It makes sense to use this for saving skipped question numbers and their percentages. This way it's possible to move some questions to the end. It might make sense to skip 2% or 3% questions and go directly to higher ones.

Contexts

You'll receive access to various different clusters and resources in each. They provide you the exact command you need to run to connect to another cluster/context. But you should be comfortable working in different namespaces with kubectl.

PSI Bridge

Starting with PSI Bridge:

  • The exam will now be taken using the PSI Secure Browser, which can be downloaded using the newest versions of Microsoft Edge, Safari, Chrome, or Firefox
  • Multiple monitors will no longer be permitted
  • Use of personal bookmarks will no longer be permitted

The new ExamUI includes improved features such as:

  • A remote desktop configured with the tools and software needed to complete the tasks
  • A timer that displays the actual time remaining (in minutes) and provides an alert with 30, 15, or 5 minute remaining
  • The content panel remains the same (presented on the Left Hand Side of the ExamUI)

Read more here.

Browser Terminal Setup

It should be considered to spend ~1 minute in the beginning to setup your terminal. In the real exam the vast majority of questions will be done from the main terminal. For few you might need to ssh into another machine. Just be aware that configurations to your shell will not be transferred in this case.

Minimal Setup

Alias

The alias k for kubectl will already be configured together with autocompletion. In case not you can configure it using this link.

Vim

The following settings will already be configured in your real exam environment in ~/.vimrc. But it can never hurt to be able to type these down:

set tabstop=2
set expandtab
set shiftwidth=2

The expandtab make sure to use spaces for tabs. Memorize these and just type them down. You can't have any written notes with commands on your desktop etc.

Optional Setup

Fast dry-run output

export do="--dry-run=client -o yaml"

This way you can just run k run pod1 --image=nginx $do. Short for "dry output", but use whatever name you like.

Fast pod delete

export now="--force --grace-period 0"

This way you can run k delete pod1 $now and don't have to wait for ~30 seconds termination time.

Persist bash settings

You can store aliases and other setup in ~/.bashrc if you're planning on using different shells or tmux.

Alias Namespace

In addition you could define an alias like:

alias kn='kubectl config set-context --current --namespace '

Which allows you to define the default namespace of the current context. Then once you switch a context or namespace you can just run:

kn default        # set default to default
kn my-namespace   # set default to my-namespace

But only do this if you used it before and are comfortable doing so. Else you need to specify the namespace for every call, which is also fine:

k -n my-namespace get all
k -n my-namespace get pod
...

Be fast

Use the history command to reuse already entered commands or use even faster history search through **Ctrl r **.

If a command takes some time to execute, like sometimes kubectl delete pod x. You can put a task in the background using Ctrl z and pull it back into foreground running command fg.

You can delete pods fast with:

k delete pod x --grace-period 0 --force

k delete pod x $now # if export from above is configured

Vim

Be great with vim.

toggle vim line numbers

When in vim you can press Esc and type :set number or :set nonumber followed by Enter to toggle line numbers. This can be useful when finding syntax errors based on line - but can be bad when wanting to mark&copy by mouse. You can also just jump to a line number with Esc :22 + Enter.

copy&paste

Get used to copy/paste/cut with vim:

Mark lines: Esc+V (then arrow keys)
Copy marked lines: y
Cut marked lines: d
Past lines: p or P

Indent multiple lines

To indent multiple lines press Esc and type :set shiftwidth=2. First mark multiple lines using Shift v and the up/down keys. Then to indent the marked lines press > or <. You can then press . to repeat the action.

Split terminal screen

By default tmux is installed and can be used to split your one terminal into multiple. But just do this if you know your shit, because scrolling is different and copy&pasting might be weird.

https://www.hamvocke.com/blog/a-quick-and-easy-guide-to-tmux

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Practice questions for Certified Kubernetes Security Specialist (CKS) exam

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