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Can Container Fusion Be Securely Achieved?

Published: 09 December 2019 Publication History

Abstract

Linux containers are key enablers for building microservices. The application's microservices fall broadly under two categories, the core-microservices implementing the business logic and the utility-microservices implementing middleware functionalities. Such functionalities include vulnerability scanning, monitoring, telemetry, etc. Segregating the utility-microservices in separate containers from the core-microservice containers may prevent them from achieving their functionality. This is due to the strong isolation between containers. By diffusing the boundaries between containers we can fuse them together and enable close collaboration. However, this raises several security concerns, especially that the utility-microservices may include vulnerabilities that threaten the entire application. In this paper, we analyze the different techniques to enhance the security of container fusion and present an automated solution based on Kubernetes to configure utility-microservices containers to fuse with core-microservices containers.

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Cited By

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  • (2023)Microservices Security Challenges and ApproachesProceedings of the 30th International Conference on Information Systems Development10.62036/ISD.2022.27Online publication date: 2023
  • (2023)Access Control Design Practice and Solutions in Cloud-Native Architecture: A Systematic Mapping StudySensors10.3390/s2307341323:7(3413)Online publication date: 24-Mar-2023
  • (2023)Take Over the Whole Cluster: Attacking Kubernetes via Excessive Permissions of Third-party ApplicationsProceedings of the 2023 ACM SIGSAC Conference on Computer and Communications Security10.1145/3576915.3623121(3048-3062)Online publication date: 15-Nov-2023
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cover image ACM Conferences
WOC '19: Proceedings of the 5th International Workshop on Container Technologies and Container Clouds
December 2019
52 pages
ISBN:9781450370332
DOI:10.1145/3366615
Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than ACM must be honored. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. Request permissions from [email protected]

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Publication History

Published: 09 December 2019

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Author Tags

  1. Kubernetes
  2. Linux containers
  3. microservices
  4. orchestration
  5. security

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Cited By

View all
  • (2023)Microservices Security Challenges and ApproachesProceedings of the 30th International Conference on Information Systems Development10.62036/ISD.2022.27Online publication date: 2023
  • (2023)Access Control Design Practice and Solutions in Cloud-Native Architecture: A Systematic Mapping StudySensors10.3390/s2307341323:7(3413)Online publication date: 24-Mar-2023
  • (2023)Take Over the Whole Cluster: Attacking Kubernetes via Excessive Permissions of Third-party ApplicationsProceedings of the 2023 ACM SIGSAC Conference on Computer and Communications Security10.1145/3576915.3623121(3048-3062)Online publication date: 15-Nov-2023
  • (2023)Flow based containerized honeypot approach for network traffic analysis: An empirical studyComputer Science Review10.1016/j.cosrev.2023.10060050(100600)Online publication date: Nov-2023
  • (2023)Container Security: Precaution levels, Mitigation Strategies, and Research PerspectivesComputers & Security10.1016/j.cose.2023.103490(103490)Online publication date: Sep-2023
  • (2023)SoKComputers and Security10.1016/j.cose.2023.103119127:COnline publication date: 1-Apr-2023
  • (2020)Container Hardening Through Automated Seccomp ProfilingProceedings of the 2020 6th International Workshop on Container Technologies and Container Clouds10.1145/3429885.3429966(31-36)Online publication date: 7-Dec-2020

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