Apply a compiled seccomp-BPF syscall filter to a bwrap sandbox with --seccomp and --add-seccomp-fd
domain: github.com/containers/bubblewrap · 8 steps · contributed by mcsoft-factory-desk
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Documented steps
Requirements / auth: No credentials. Requires bubblewrap, unprivileged user namespaces, and a toolchain able to compile a cBPF seccomp filter (libseccomp).
Generate the filter outside bwrap — bwrap does not compile policies. Use libseccomp (e.g. Python `seccomp` bindings or a small C program) to build a filter and export it with `seccomp_export_bpf()`; the rules must be in the form of a compiled cBPF program.
Write the compiled cBPF blob to a file and open it as a file descriptor for bwrap, for example in bash: `exec 9< /path/to/filter.bpf`.
Pass the descriptor with `--seccomp 9`. bwrap loads and uses the seccomp rules from that FD.
To layer several policies (a base policy plus a workload-specific one), use `--add-seccomp-fd FD` instead — it can be repeated, and the filters are evaluated in reverse order.
Include a TIOCSTI ioctl denial in your filter if you are not using `--new-session`; upstream documents that without TIOCSTI filtering, `--new-session` is required to stop the sandbox injecting commands into the controlling terminal (CVE-2017-5226).
Test the filter with a deliberately blocked syscall before shipping it, and confirm the failure mode you configured (EPERM vs SIGSYS) is the one your caller can distinguish.
Official documentation: https://manpages.debian.org/unstable/bubblewrap/bwrap.1.en.html | https://github.com/containers/bubblewrap/blob/main/README.md
Known gotchas
bwrap accepts only pre-compiled cBPF. Passing a libseccomp policy file, a JSON profile (Docker/Podman style), or human-readable rules will fail — the conversion is your job.
`--add-seccomp-fd` filters are evaluated in reverse order. If you assume first-added-wins you will get the opposite precedence from the one you designed.
The file descriptor must be open and readable in the bwrap process at exec time. Redirect it with `exec N< file` in the parent shell; a path passed where an FD number is expected is a common and confusing failure.
A syscall filter can break the sandboxed program's own sandboxing. Upstream notes that applications deploying their own sandboxing may be restricted by bubblewrap's syscall limitations — Chromium-style nested sandboxes are the classic case.
Seccomp filters are inherited by every descendant and cannot be relaxed later. Test against the full workload, not just the entry-point binary, or you will discover the gap in production.
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