falco/examples/k8s-using-daemonset

Example Kubernetes Daemon Sets for Sysdig Falco

This directory gives you the required YAML files to stand up Sysdig Falco on Kubernetes as a Daemon Set. This will result in a Falco Pod being deployed to each node, and thus the ability to monitor any running containers for abnormal behavior.

The two options are provided to deploy a Daemon Set:

• k8s-with-rbac - This directory provides a definition to deploy a Daemon Set on Kubernetes with RBAC enabled.
• k8s-without-rbac - This directory provides a definition to deploy a Daemon Set on Kubernetes without RBAC enabled.

Also provided:

• falco-event-generator-deployment.yaml - A Kubernetes Deployment to generate sample events. This is useful for testing, but note it will generate a large number of events.

Deploying to Kubernetes with RBAC enabled

Since v1.8 RBAC has been available in Kubernetes, and running with RBAC enabled is considered the best practice. The k8s-with-rbac directory provides the YAML to create a Service Account for Falco, as well as the ClusterRoles and bindings to grant the appropriate permissions to the Service Account.

k8s-using-daemonset$ kubectl create -f k8s-with-rbac/falco-account.yaml
serviceaccount "falco-account" created
clusterrole "falco-cluster-role" created
clusterrolebinding "falco-cluster-role-binding" created
k8s-using-daemonset$

The Daemon Set also relies on a Kubernetes ConfigMap to store the Falco configuration and make the configuration available to the Falco Pods. This allows you to manage custom configuration without rebuilding and redeploying the underlying Pods. In order to create the ConfigMap you'll need to first need to copy the required configuration from their location in this GitHub repo to the k8s-with-rbac/falco-config/ directory. Any modification of the configuration should be performed on these copies rather than the original files.

k8s-using-daemonset$ cp ../../falco.yaml k8s-with-rbac/falco-config/
k8s-using-daemonset$ cp ../../rules/falco_rules.* k8s-with-rbac/falco-config/

If you want to send Falco alerts to a Slack channel, you'll want to modify the falco.yaml file to point to your Slack webhook. For more information on getting a webhook URL for your Slack team, refer to the Slack documentation. Add the below to the bottom of the falco.yaml config file you just copied to enable Slack messages.

program_output:
  enabled: true
  keep_alive: false
  program: "jq '{text: .output}' | curl -d @- -X POST https://hooks.slack.com/services/see_your_slack_team/apps_settings_for/a_webhook_url"

You will also need to enable JSON output. Find the json_output: false setting in the falco.yaml file and change it to read json_output: true. Any custom rules for your environment can be added to into the falco_rules.local.yaml file and they will be picked up by Falco at start time. You can now create the ConfigMap in Kubernetes.

k8s-using-daemonset$ kubectl create configmap falco-config --from-file=k8s-with-rbac/falco-config
configmap "falco-config" created
k8s-using-daemonset$

Now that we have the requirements for our Daemon Set in place, we can create our Daemon Set.

k8s-using-daemonset$ kubectl create -f k8s-with-rbac/falco-daemonset-configmap.yaml 
daemonset "falco" created
k8s-using-daemonset$

Deploying to Kubernetes without RBAC enabled

If you are running Kubernetes with Legacy Authorization enabled, you can use kubectl to deploy the Daemon Set provided in the k8s-without-rbac directory. The example provides the ability to post messages to a Slack channel via a webhook. For more information on getting a webhook URL for your Slack team, refer to the Slack documentation. Modify the args passed to the Falco container to point to the appropriate URL for your webhook.

k8s-using-daemonset$ kubectl create -f k8s-without-rbac/falco-daemonset.yaml

Verifying the installation

In order to test that Falco is working correctly, you can launch a shell in a Pod. You should see a message in your Slack channel (if configured), or in the logs of the Falco pod.

k8s-using-daemonset$ kubectl get pods
NAME          READY     STATUS    RESTARTS   AGE
falco-74htl   1/1       Running   0          13h
falco-fqz2m   1/1       Running   0          13h
falco-sgjfx   1/1       Running   0          13h
k8s-using-daemonset$ kubectl exec -it falco-74htl bash
root@falco-74htl:/# exit
k8s-using-daemonset$ kubectl logs falco-74htl
{"output":"17:48:58.590038385: Notice A shell was spawned in a container with an attached terminal (user=root k8s.pod=falco-74htl container=a98c2aa8e670 shell=bash parent=<NA> cmdline=bash  terminal=34816)","priority":"Notice","rule":"Terminal shell in container","time":"2017-12-20T17:48:58.590038385Z", "output_fields": {"container.id":"a98c2aa8e670","evt.time":1513792138590038385,"k8s.pod.name":"falco-74htl","proc.cmdline":"bash ","proc.name":"bash","proc.pname":null,"proc.tty":34816,"user.name":"root"}}
k8s-using-daemonset$

Alternatively, you can deploy the Falco Event Generator deployement to have events automatically generated. Please note that this Deployment will generate a large number of events.

k8s-using-daemonset$ kubectl create -f falco-event-generator-deployment.yaml \
&& sleep 1 \
&& kubectl delete -f falco-event-generator-deployment.yaml
deployment "falco-event-generator-deployment" created
deployment "falco-event-generator-deployment" deleted
k8s-using-daemonset$