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MAC_DO(4) Kernel Interfaces Manual MAC_DO(4) NAME mac_do -- policy allowing unprivileged users to change process creden- tials SYNOPSIS To compile the mac_do policy into your kernel, place the following lines in your kernel configuration file: options MAC options MAC_DO Alternately, to load this policy module at boot time, place the follow- ing line in your kernel configuration file: options MAC and in loader.conf(5): mac_do_load="YES" DESCRIPTION The mac_do policy module allows unprivileged users to change process credentials according to rules configured by the administrator. It supports per-jail configuration. Currently, the mac_do policy module only produces effects to processes spawned from the /usr/bin/mdo executable, please see mdo(1) for more details on this program. CREDENTIALS RULES Rules specify which transitions of process credentials mac_do will al- low, based on current process credentials and the desired final ones. They are passed by an administrator in the form of a string having the specific syntax described below in a top-bottom manner. They have been designed to be able to finely describe the desired target credentials in a safe and compact way. Top-Level List of Rules At the top, rules are a possibly empty list of individual rules sepa- rated by a semi-colon (`');: <rules> [<rule> [`;' <rule>]*] They form a disjunction, i.e., mac_do authorizes a credentials transi- tion as soon as at least one rule in the list matches. One rule is composed of a <from> part (also called "match") and a <to> part (also called "target"), in this order, separated by a greater-than sign (`>'): <rule> <from> `>' <to> Rule's <from> Part The first part of a rule, <from>, is matched against the credentials of the process requesting some credentials transition. It has the form: <from> <type> `=' <id> <type> must be: <type> [`uid' | `gid'] i.e., one of the literal strings `uid' or `gid'. <id> must be the nu- merical ID of a user or group and is matched against the current process real ID of the corresponding type, and on type `gid' addition- ally against the supplementary groups. Rule's <to> Part The second part of a rule, <to>, is a comma-separated (`'), non-empty list of target clauses: <to> <target_clause> [`,' <target_clause>]* Target clauses of a given rule also form a disjunction, i.e., the IDs they specify are alternatives for the target credentials, except in some cases described below. The next subsections describe the syntax of target clauses, the de- faults that apply and the principle of non-redundancy and non-contra- diction in each rule's <to> part. Target Clauses A target clause in a rule's <to> part must be of one of the following forms: <target_clause> `any' <target_clause> <flags> <type> `=' <id> The first form is a compact way to specify that any target credentials are allowed. The second form is similar to that of <from> clauses, with the following extensions: • <id> may also be a literal `*' or `any' or `'.. `*' and `any' both designate any ID for the specified <type>, and are treated identi- cally. `'. designates the process' current IDs for the specified <type>, as explained below. • <flags> may contain at most one of the `+', `-' and `'! charac- ters, and may be non-empty only when <type> is `gid'. Addition- ally, if <id> is `*' or `any', only the `+' flag may appear. For target clauses of `gid' type, an absence of flag indicates that the specified group ID is allowed as the real, effective and/or saved group IDs (the "primary" groups). Conversely, the presence of any allowed flag indicates that the specification concerns supplementary groups. Each flag has a specific meaning: • `+' indicates that the group ID is allowed as a supplementary group. • `'! indicates that the group ID is mandatory, i.e., it must be listed in the supplementary groups. • `-' indicates that the group ID must not be listed in the supple- mentary groups. A specification with `-' is only useful in conjunction with a `+'-tagged specification where only one of them has `'. as its <id>. Target clauses having the `'! or `-' flag are "forcing" clauses, and as such do not take part in the disjunction of the other target clauses but rather unconditionally apply in their rule. `'. is a placeholder for IDs that the calling process already has on privilege check. For type `uid', it designates any of the process' real, effective or saved user IDs. For type `gid', its effect depends on whether flags are present. If none is present, it designates any of the process' real, effective or saved group IDs. If one is present, it designates any of the process' supplementary groups. Defaults for the <to> Part If the <to> part does not list a target clause with type `uid', any of the current user IDs of the calling process is accepted. In other words, in this case, mac_do behaves as if a target clause of: uid=. had been listed. Similarly, if the <to> part does not list a target clause with type `gid', all the groups of the calling process are assumed to be re- quired. More precisely, each of the desired real, effective and saved group IDs must be one of the current real, effective or saved group ID, and all supplementary groups must be the same as those that are cur- rent. It is as if the <to> part had contained the following two clauses: gid=.,!gid=. Non-Redundancy and Non-Contradiction in a <to> Part No two target clauses of a single rule may express the exact same logi- cal intent nor contradictory ones. In practice, no two clauses may display the same ID except for group IDs but only if, each time the same ID appears, it does so with a dif- ferent flag, or no flags only once. Additionally, the specified flags in multiple occurences must not be contradictory. For example, the same group ID appearing with both `+' and `-' will cause rejection of the rule. Parsing Specifics Any amount of whitespace is allowed around tokens of the above grammar, except that there may be no spaces between <flags> and <id> in target clauses. For convenience, numerical IDs may be specified as negative integers, which are then converted to unsigned ones as specified in the C stan- dard for the uid_t and gid_t types, which are both 64-bit unsigned in- tegers. RUNTIME CONFIGURATION The following sysctl(8) knobs are available: security.mac.do.enabled Enable the mac_do policy. (Default: 1). security.mac.do.rules The list of credential rules, whose syntax is described in the "CREDENTIALS RULES" section above. This list is specific to each jail. Please see the "JAIL SUPPORT" section below for more details on the interaction of mac_do with jails. security.mac.do.print_parse_error Logs a message on trying to set incorrect rules via the security.mac.do.rules sysctl(8) knob. JAIL SUPPORT mac_do supports per-jail configuration of rules. By default, at creation, a new jail has no credentials rules, effec- tively disabling mac_do for its processes. The following jail parameters are defined: mac.do Possible values are: `enable' mac_do will enforce specific credential rules in the jail. The mac.do.rules jail parameter must also be set in this case. `disable' Disables mac_do in the jail. Strictly equivalent to jail creation's default behavior and to setting the rules to an empty string. `inherit' The jail's credentials rules are inherited from the jail's parent (which may themselves have been inherited). Modified rules propagate to all chil- dren jails configured for inheritance. mac.do.rules The credentials rules for the jail. It is always equal to the value that can be retrieved by the sysctl(8) knob security.mac.do.rules described in section "RUNTIME CONFIGURATION". If set, and the jail parameter mac.do is not so explicitly, the value of the latter will default to `disable' if empty, else to `enable'. Each jail must have mdo(1) installed at path /usr/bin/mdo, as this path is currently not configurable. EXAMPLES Here are several examples of single rules matching processes having a real user ID of 10001: uid=10001>uid=10002 Allows the process to switch all of its real, effective or saved user ID to 10002, but keeping the groups it is already in, and with the same primary/supplementary groups split. uid=10001>uid=10002,uid=10003 Same as the first example, but also allows to switch to UID 10003 instead of 10002, or possibly having both in different user IDs. uid=10001>uid=10002,gid=10002 Same as the first example, but the new primary groups must be set to 10002 and no supplementary groups should be set. uid=10001>uid=10002,gid=10002,+gid=. Same as the previous example, but in addition allowing to re- tain any current supplementary groups. uid=10001>uid=10002,gid=10002,!gid=. Same as the previous example, but with the additional con- straint that all current supplementary groups must be kept. uid=10001>uid=10002,gid=10002,+gid=.,-gid=10001 Same as `uid=10001>uid=10002,gid=10002,+gid=.' above, but 10001 cannot be retained as a supplementary group. uid=10001>uid=10002,gid=10002,+gid=.,!gid=10003 Same as `uid=10001>uid=10002,gid=10002,+gid=.' above, with the additional constraint that 10003 must appear in the supplemen- tary groups. uid=10001>uid=10002,gid=*,+gid=* Same as the first example, but lifting any constraints on groups, allowing the process to become part of any groups it sees fit. Here are several examples of single rules matching processes having 10001 as their real group IDs or in their supplementary groups: gid=10001>uid=0 Makes 10001 a more powerful `wheel' group, allowing its members to switch to root without password. gid=10001>gid=10002 Allows the process to enter GID 10002 as a primary group, but only if giving up all its supplementary groups. gid=10001>gid=10002,+gid=. Same as the previous example, but allows to retain any current supplementary groups. gid=10001>gid=10002,!gid=. Same as the previous example, but with the additional con- straint that all current supplementary groups must be kept. SEE ALSO mdo(1), setcred(2), mac(4), jail(8), sysctl(8) AUTHORS Olivier Certner <olce@FreeBSD.org> Baptiste Daroussin <bapt@FreeBSD.org> BUGS Currently, mac_do considers only credentials transitions requested through the setcred(2) system call. This system call was in large part created so that mac_do can see whole credentials transitions to decide whether to authorize them, which the traditional UNIX's piecewise ap- proach of successively changing different parts of them cannot allow. However, calls to traditional or standard credentials-changing func- tions can be considered as full transitions on their own, however lim- ited, and as such should be equally monitored by mac_do. Future work will lift this restriction. SECURITY CONSIDERATIONS The threat model for mac_do is to consider userland programs as gener- ally untrustable to decide upon which credentials changes are accept- able. It is in contrast with the traditional UNIX way to change cre- dentials, in which specialized programs are installed with the setuid bit, giving them full administrator privileges so that they are effec- tively able to establish new ones. Vulnerabilities in such creden- tials-changing programs can have catastrophic consequences on the in- tegrity of the system. Consequently, mac_do does not rely on companion userland programs to decide whether some credentials transition is acceptable. Instead, it maintains its own configuration independently from the userland pass- word and group databases. Establishing this configuration currently itself relies on userland programs issuing calls to sysctl(3) or jail(2). It should thus be established near system boot or jail start, before any possible attacks could happen on the system, and further measures should be taken to ensure that potential corruptions does not affect the configuration in subsequent restarts, such as re-establish- ing pristine state or ensuring that the boot procedure up to the con- figuration of mac_do can be trusted. FreeBSD 15.0 June 11, 2025 MAC_DO(4)
NAME | SYNOPSIS | DESCRIPTION | CREDENTIALS RULES | RUNTIME CONFIGURATION | JAIL SUPPORT | EXAMPLES | SEE ALSO | AUTHORS | BUGS | SECURITY CONSIDERATIONS
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