SPIRE

SPIRE is a production-ready implementation of the SPIFFE specification that performs node and workload attestation in order to securely issue cryptographic identities to workloads running in heterogeneous environments. SPIRE can be configured as a source of cryptographic identities for Istio workloads through an integration with Envoy’s SDS API. Istio can detect the existence of a UNIX Domain Socket that implements the Envoy SDS API on a defined socket path, allowing Envoy to communicate and fetch identities directly from it.

This integration with SPIRE provides flexible attestation options not available with the default Istio identity management while harnessing Istio’s powerful service management. For example, SPIRE’s plugin architecture enables diverse workload attestation options beyond the Kubernetes namespace and service account attestation offered by Istio. SPIRE’s node attestation extends attestation to the physical or virtual hardware on which workloads run.

For a quick demo of how this SPIRE integration with Istio works, see Integrating SPIRE as a CA through Envoy’s SDS API.

Note that this integration requires version 1.14 for both istioctl and the data plane.

The integration is compatible with Istio upgrades.

Install SPIRE

Option 1: Quick start

Istio provides a basic sample installation to quickly get SPIRE up and running:

Zip

  1. $ kubectl apply -f @samples/security/spire/spire-quickstart.yaml@

This will deploy SPIRE into your cluster, along with two additional components: the SPIFFE CSI Driver — used to share the SPIRE Agent’s UNIX Domain Socket with the other pods throughout the node — and the SPIRE Kubernetes Workload Registrar, a facilitator that performs automatic workload registration within Kubernetes. See Install Istio to configure Istio and integrate with the SPIFFE CSI Driver.

Option 2: Configure a custom SPIRE installation

See the SPIRE’s Quick start for Kubernetes guide to get started deploying SPIRE into your Kubernetes environment. See SPIRE CA Integration Prerequisites for more information on configuring SPIRE to integrate with Istio deployments.

SPIRE CA Integration Prerequisites

To integrate your SPIRE deployment with Istio, configure SPIRE:

  1. Access the SPIRE Agent reference and configure the SPIRE Agent socket path to match the Envoy SDS defined socket path.

    1. socket_path = "/run/secrets/workload-spiffe-uds/socket"

  2. Share the SPIRE Agent socket with the pods within the node by deploying the SPIFFE CSI Driver. The -workload-api-socket-dir argument to the driver should be the mount location of the socket’s directory.

See Install Istio to configure Istio to integrate with the SPIFFE CSI Driver.

Istio will become the Envoy SDS listener if the socket is not created by SPIRE before the Istio agent starts up. This timing is controlled by customizing the IstioOperator.

Install Istio

  1. Download Istio release 1.14+.

  2. After deploying SPIRE into your environment, and verifying that all deployments are in Ready state, install Istio with custom patches for the Ingress-gateway as well as for istio-proxy.

    1. $ istioctl install --skip-confirmation -f - <<EOF
    2. apiVersion: install.istio.io/v1alpha1
    3. kind: IstioOperator
    4. metadata:
    5.   namespace: istio-system
    6. spec:
    7.   profile: default
    8.   meshConfig:
    9.     trustDomain: example.org
    10.   values:
    11.     global:
    12.     # This is used to customize the sidecar template
    13.     sidecarInjectorWebhook:
    14.       templates:
    15.         spire: |
    16.           spec:
    17.             containers:
    18.             - name: istio-proxy
    19.               volumeMounts:
    20.               - name: workload-socket
    21.                 mountPath: /run/secrets/workload-spiffe-uds
    22.                 readOnly: true
    23.             volumes:
    24.               - name: workload-socket
    25.                 csi:
    26.                   driver: "csi.spiffe.io"
    27.   components:
    28.     ingressGateways:
    29.       - name: istio-ingressgateway
    30.         enabled: true
    31.         label:
    32.           istio: ingressgateway
    33.         k8s:
    34.           overlays:
    35.             - apiVersion: apps/v1
    36.               kind: Deployment
    37.               name: istio-ingressgateway
    38.               patches:
    39.                 - path: spec.template.spec.volumes.[name:workload-socket]
    40.                   value:
    41.                     name: workload-socket
    42.                     csi:
    43.                       driver: "csi.spiffe.io"
    44.                 - path: spec.template.spec.containers.[name:istio-proxy].volumeMounts.[name:workload-socket]
    45.                   value:
    46.                     name: workload-socket
    47.                     mountPath: "/run/secrets/workload-spiffe-uds"
    48.                     readOnly: true
    49.                 - path: spec.template.spec.initContainers
    50.                   value:
    51.                     - name: wait-for-spire-socket
    52.                       image: busybox:1.28
    53.                       volumeMounts:
    54.                         - name: workload-socket
    55.                           mountPath: /run/secrets/workload-spiffe-uds
    56.                           readOnly: true
    57.                       env:
    58.                         - name: CHECK_FILE
    59.                           value: /run/secrets/workload-spiffe-uds/socket
    60.                       command:
    61.                         - sh
    62.                         - "-c"
    63.                         - |-
    64.                           echo `date -Iseconds` Waiting for: ${CHECK_FILE}
    65.                           while [[ ! -e ${CHECK_FILE} ]] ; do
    66.                             echo `date -Iseconds` File does not exist: ${CHECK_FILE}
    67.                             sleep 15
    68.                           done
    69.                           ls -l ${CHECK_FILE}
    70. EOF

    This will share the spiffe-csi-driver with the Ingress Gateway and the sidecars that are going to be injected on workload pods, granting them access to the SPIRE Agent’s UNIX Domain Socket.

    This will also add an initContainer to the gateway that will wait for SPIRE to create the UNIX Domain Socket before starting the istio-proxy. If the SPIRE agent is not ready or has not been properly configured with the same socket path, the Ingress Gateway initContainer will wait forever.

  3. Use sidecar injection to inject the istio-proxy container into the pods within your mesh. See custom templates for information on how to apply the custom defined spire template into istio-proxy. This allows for the CSI driver to mount the UDS on the sidecars.

    Check Ingress-gateway pod state:

    1. $ kubectl get pods -n istio-system
    2. NAME                                    READY   STATUS    RESTARTS   AGE
    3. istio-ingressgateway-5b45864fd4-lgrxs   0/1     Running   0          17s
    4. istiod-989f54d9c-sg7sn                  1/1     Running   0          23s

Data plane containers will only reach Ready if a corresponding registration entry is created for them on the SPIRE Server. Then, Envoy will be able to fetch cryptographic identities from SPIRE. See Register workloads to register entries for services in your mesh.

Register workloads

This section describes the options available for registering workloads in a SPIRE Server.

Option 1: Automatic registration using the SPIRE workload registrar

By deploying SPIRE Kubernetes Workload Registrar along with a SPIRE Server, new entries are automatically registered for each new pod that is created.

See Verifying that identities were created for workloads to check issued identities.

Note that SPIRE workload registrar is used in the quick start section.

Option 2: Manual Registration

To improve workload attestation security robustness, SPIRE is able to verify against a group of selector values based on different parameters. Skip these steps if you installed SPIRE by following the quick start since it uses automatic registration.

  1. Generate an entry for an Ingress Gateway with a set of selectors such as the pod name and pod UID:

    1. $ INGRESS_POD=$(kubectl get pod -l istio=ingressgateway -n istio-system -o jsonpath="{.items[0].metadata.name}")
    2. $ INGRESS_POD_UID=$(kubectl get pods -n istio-system $INGRESS_POD -o jsonpath='{.metadata.uid}')

  2. Get the spire-server pod:

    1. $ SPIRE_SERVER_POD=$(kubectl get pod -l app=spire-server -n spire -o jsonpath="{.items[0].metadata.name}")

  3. Register an entry for the SPIRE Agent running on the node:

    1. $ kubectl exec -n spire $SPIRE_SERVER_POD -- \
    2. /opt/spire/bin/spire-server entry create \
    3.     -spiffeID spiffe://example.org/ns/spire/sa/spire-agent \
    4.     -selector k8s_psat:cluster:demo-cluster \
    5.     -selector k8s_psat:agent_ns:spire \
    6.     -selector k8s_psat:agent_sa:spire-agent \
    7.     -node -socketPath /run/spire/sockets/server.sock
    9. Entry ID         : d38c88d0-7d7a-4957-933c-361a0a3b039c
    10. SPIFFE ID        : spiffe://example.org/ns/spire/sa/spire-agent
    11. Parent ID        : spiffe://example.org/spire/server
    12. Revision         : 0
    13. TTL              : default
    14. Selector         : k8s_psat:agent_ns:spire
    15. Selector         : k8s_psat:agent_sa:spire-agent
    16. Selector         : k8s_psat:cluster:demo-cluster

  4. Register an entry for the Ingress-gateway pod:

    1. $ kubectl exec -n spire $SPIRE_SERVER_POD -- \
    2. /opt/spire/bin/spire-server entry create \
    3.     -spiffeID spiffe://example.org/ns/istio-system/sa/istio-ingressgateway-service-account \
    4.     -parentID spiffe://example.org/ns/spire/sa/spire-agent \
    5.     -selector k8s:sa:istio-ingressgateway-service-account \
    6.     -selector k8s:ns:istio-system \
    7.     -selector k8s:pod-uid:$INGRESS_POD_UID \
    8.     -dns $INGRESS_POD \
    9.     -dns istio-ingressgateway.istio-system.svc \
    10.     -socketPath /run/spire/sockets/server.sock
    12. Entry ID         : 6f2fe370-5261-4361-ac36-10aae8d91ff7
    13. SPIFFE ID        : spiffe://example.org/ns/istio-system/sa/istio-ingressgateway-service-account
    14. Parent ID        : spiffe://example.org/ns/spire/sa/spire-agent
    15. Revision         : 0
    16. TTL              : default
    17. Selector         : k8s:ns:istio-system
    18. Selector         : k8s:pod-uid:63c2bbf5-a8b1-4b1f-ad64-f62ad2a69807
    19. Selector         : k8s:sa:istio-ingressgateway-service-account
    20. DNS name         : istio-ingressgateway.istio-system.svc
    21. DNS name         : istio-ingressgateway-5b45864fd4-lgrxs

  5. Deploy an example workload:

    Zip

    1. $ istioctl kube-inject --filename @samples/security/spire/sleep-spire.yaml@ | kubectl apply -f -

    Note that the workload will need the SPIFFE CSI Driver volume to access the SPIRE Agent socket. To accomplish this, you can leverage the spire pod annotation template from the Install Istio section or add the CSI volume to the deployment spec of your workload. Both of these alternatives are highlighted on the example snippet below:

    1. apiVersion: apps/v1
    2. kind: Deployment
    3. metadata:
    4.   name: sleep
    5. spec:
    6.   replicas: 1
    7.   selector:
    8.       matchLabels:
    9.         app: sleep
    10.   template:
    11.       metadata:
    12.         labels:
    13.           app: sleep
    14.         # Injects custom sidecar template
    15.         annotations:
    16.             inject.istio.io/templates: "sidecar,spire"
    17.       spec:
    18.         terminationGracePeriodSeconds: 0
    19.         serviceAccountName: sleep
    20.         containers:
    21.         - name: sleep
    22.           image: curlimages/curl
    23.           command: ["/bin/sleep", "3650d"]
    24.           imagePullPolicy: IfNotPresent
    25.           volumeMounts:
    26.             - name: tmp
    27.               mountPath: /tmp
    28.           securityContext:
    29.             runAsUser: 1000
    30.         volumes:
    31.           - name: tmp
    32.             emptyDir: {}
    33.           # CSI volume
    34.           - name: workload-socket
    35.             csi:
    36.               driver: "csi.spiffe.io"
    37.               readOnly: true

  6. Get pod information:

    1. $ SLEEP_POD=$(kubectl get pod -l app=sleep -o jsonpath="{.items[0].metadata.name}")
    2. $ SLEEP_POD_UID=$(kubectl get pods $SLEEP_POD -o jsonpath='{.metadata.uid}')

  7. Register the workload:

    1. $ kubectl exec -n spire spire-server-0 -- \
    2. /opt/spire/bin/spire-server entry create \
    3.     -spiffeID spiffe://example.org/ns/default/sa/sleep \
    4.     -parentID spiffe://example.org/ns/spire/sa/spire-agent \
    5.     -selector k8s:ns:default \
    6.     -selector k8s:pod-uid:$SLEEP_POD_UID \
    7.     -dns $SLEEP_POD \
    8.     -socketPath /run/spire/sockets/server.sock

SPIFFE IDs for workloads must follow the Istio SPIFFE ID pattern: spiffe://<trust.domain>/ns/<namespace>/sa/<service-account>

See the SPIRE help on Registering workloads to learn how to create new entries for workloads and get them attested using multiple selectors to strengthen attestation criteria.

Verifying that identities were created for workloads

Use the following command to confirm that identities were created for the workloads:

  1. $ kubectl exec -i -t $SPIRE_SERVER_POD -n spire -c spire-server -- /bin/sh -c "bin/spire-server entry show -socketPath /run/spire/sockets/server.sock"
  2. Found 3 entries
  3. Entry ID         : c8dfccdc-9762-4762-80d3-5434e5388ae7
  4. SPIFFE ID        : spiffe://example.org/ns/istio-system/sa/istio-ingressgateway-service-account
  5. Parent ID        : spiffe://example.org/ns/spire/sa/spire-agent
  6. Revision         : 0
  7. TTL              : default
  8. Selector         : k8s:ns:istio-system
  9. Selector         : k8s:pod-uid:88b71387-4641-4d9c-9a89-989c88f7509d
  10. Selector         : k8s:sa:istio-ingressgateway-service-account
  11. DNS name         : istio-ingressgateway-5b45864fd4-lgrxs
  13. Entry ID         : af7b53dc-4cc9-40d3-aaeb-08abbddd8e54
  14. SPIFFE ID        : spiffe://example.org/ns/default/sa/sleep
  15. Parent ID        : spiffe://example.org/ns/spire/sa/spire-agent
  16. Revision         : 0
  17. TTL              : default
  18. Selector         : k8s:ns:default
  19. Selector         : k8s:pod-uid:ee490447-e502-46bd-8532-5a746b0871d6
  20. DNS name         : sleep-5f4d47c948-njvpk
  22. Entry ID         : f0544fd7-1945-4bd1-88dc-0a5513fdae1c
  23. SPIFFE ID        : spiffe://example.org/ns/spire/sa/spire-agent
  24. Parent ID        : spiffe://example.org/spire/server
  25. Revision         : 0
  26. TTL              : default
  27. Selector         : k8s_psat:agent_ns:spire
  28. Selector         : k8s_psat:agent_sa:spire-agent
  29. Selector         : k8s_psat:cluster:demo-cluster

Check the Ingress-gateway pod state:

  1. $ kubectl get pods -n istio-system
  2. NAME                                    READY   STATUS    RESTARTS   AGE
  3. istio-ingressgateway-5b45864fd4-lgrxs   1/1     Running   0          60s
  4. istiod-989f54d9c-sg7sn                  1/1     Running   0          45s

After registering an entry for the Ingress-gateway pod, Envoy receives the identity issued by SPIRE and uses it for all TLS and mTLS communications.

Check that the workload identity was issued by SPIRE

  1. Retrieve sleep’s SVID identity document using the istioctl proxy-config secret command:

    1. $ istioctl proxy-config secret $SLEEP_POD -o json | jq -r \
    2. '.dynamicActiveSecrets[0].secret.tlsCertificate.certificateChain.inlineBytes' | base64 --decode > chain.pem

  2. Inspect the certificate and verify that SPIRE was the issuer:

    1. $ openssl x509 -in chain.pem -text | grep SPIRE
    2.     Subject: C = US, O = SPIRE, CN = sleep-5f4d47c948-njvpk

SPIFFE Federation

SPIRE Servers are able to authenticate SPIFFE identities originating from different trust domains. This is known as SPIFFE federation.

SPIRE Agent can be configured to push federated bundles to Envoy through the Envoy SDS API, allowing Envoy to use validation context to verify peer certificates and trust a workload from another trust domain. To enable Istio to federate SPIFFE identities through SPIRE integration, consult SPIRE Agent SDS configuration and set the following SDS configuration values for your SPIRE Agent configuration file.

ConfigurationDescriptionResource Name
default_svid_nameThe TLS Certificate resource name to use for the default X509-SVID with Envoy SDSdefault
default_bundle_nameThe Validation Context resource name to use for the default X.509 bundle with Envoy SDSnull
default_all_bundles_nameThe Validation Context resource name to use for all bundles (including federated) with Envoy SDSROOTCA

This will allow Envoy to get federated bundles directly from SPIRE.

Create federated registration entries

  • If using the SPIRE Kubernetes Workload Registrar, create federated entries for workloads by adding the pod annotation spiffe.io/federatesWith to the service deployment spec, specifying the trust domain you want the pod to federate with:

    1. podAnnotations:
    2.   spiffe.io/federatesWith: "<trust.domain>"

  • For manual registration see Create Registration Entries for Federation.

Cleanup SPIRE

If you installed SPIRE using the quick start SPIRE deployment provided by Istio, use the following commands to remove those Kubernetes resources:

  1. $ kubectl delete CustomResourceDefinition spiffeids.spiffeid.spiffe.io
  2. $ kubectl delete -n spire serviceaccount spire-agent
  3. $ kubectl delete -n spire configmap spire-agent
  4. $ kubectl delete -n spire deployment spire-agent
  5. $ kubectl delete csidriver csi.spiffe.io
  6. $ kubectl delete -n spire configmap spire-server
  7. $ kubectl delete -n spire service spire-server
  8. $ kubectl delete -n spire serviceaccount spire-server
  9. $ kubectl delete -n spire statefulset spire-server
  10. $ kubectl delete clusterrole spire-server-trust-role spire-agent-cluster-role
  11. $ kubectl delete clusterrolebinding spire-server-trust-role-binding spire-agent-cluster-role-binding
  12. $ kubectl delete namespace spire