Re: [PATCH 0/6] Intel Secure Guard Extensions

From: Pavel Machek
Date: Tue Apr 26 2016 - 17:52:44 EST


On Tue 2016-04-26 21:59:52, One Thousand Gnomes wrote:
> > But... that will mean that my ssh will need to be SGX-aware, and that
> > I will not be able to switch to AMD machine in future. ... or to other
> > Intel machine for that matter, right?
>
> I'm not privy to AMD's CPU design plans.
>
> However I think for the ssl/ssh case you'd use the same interfaces
> currently available for plugging in TPMs and dongles. It's a solved
> problem in the crypto libraries.
>
> > What new syscalls would be needed for ssh to get all this support?
>
> I don't see why you'd need new syscalls.

So the kernel will implement few selected crypto algorithms, similar
to what TPM would provide, using SGX, and then userspace no longer
needs to know about SGX?

Ok, I guess that's simple.

It also means it is boring, and the multiuser-game-of-the-day will not
be able to protect the (plain text) password from the cold boot
attack.

Nor will be emacs be able to protect in-memory copy of my diary from
cold boot attack.

So I guess yes, some new syscalls would be nice :-).
Pavel
--
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