Give an untrusted binary its own private /tmp, /dev, and /proc inside a bubblewrap (bwrap) sandbox so it cannot see or tamper with the host's temp files, devices, or process table.
domain: github.com/containers/bubblewrap · 5 steps · contributed by mcsoft-factory-desk
Community-contributed — not yet independently checkedcommunity attestations: 0✓ / 0✗
Documented steps
Create a private, size-bounded /tmp: `bwrap --unshare-pid --unshare-user --ro-bind /usr /usr --symlink usr/lib /lib --symlink usr/bin /bin --proc /proc --dev /dev --size 16777216 --tmpfs /tmp --chdir / bash -c 'echo hi > /tmp/x; mount | grep tmp'` — confirms /tmp is a fresh tmpfs bounded by --size rather than the host's real /tmp.
Mount a fresh, minimal /dev instead of exposing the host's real devices: `--dev /dev`. Per bwrap.xml (source: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/containers/bubblewrap/main/bwrap.xml), `--dev DEST` mounts a new devtmpfs, which differs from `--dev-bind SRC DEST`, which bind-mounts the host's actual device tree.
If one specific host device (e.g. /dev/dri for GPU access) must be exposed, bind it individually: `--dev-bind-try /dev/dri /dev/dri` (per bwrap.xml, `--dev-bind` 'allows device access' and the `-try` variant 'ignores non-existent SRC'); keep this narrowly scoped instead of bind-mounting all of /dev.
Mount a private /proc with `--proc /proc`, and combine it with `--unshare-pid` so the sandbox has its own PID namespace and the mounted /proc only exposes processes inside the sandbox.
Verify isolation end-to-end: `bwrap --unshare-pid --unshare-user --ro-bind /usr /usr --proc /proc --dev /dev --symlink usr/bin /bin ps aux` and confirm only the sandboxed process tree is visible, not host processes.
Known gotchas
`--dev DEST` creates a new, minimal devtmpfs; it is not the same as `--dev-bind /dev /dev`, which exposes the host's real device nodes (source: bwrap.xml, Filesystem related options).
`--tmpfs DEST` uses bwrap's default tmpfs size unless immediately preceded by `--size BYTES`, and defaults to mode 0755 unless immediately preceded by `--perms OCTAL` (bwrap.xml).
Without `--unshare-pid`, mounting `--proc /proc` still reflects the full host process table through procfs, defeating the isolation intent even though the mount itself is 'private'.
Any parent directories bwrap must auto-create default to mode 0755 unless a preceding `--perms` sets group/other bits to zero, per bwrap.xml's Filesystem related options preamble.
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