Connect Akto with eBPF on mTLS

Introduction

If your kubernetes system, has mTLS ( say using istio proxy or similar setup ) and SSL termination happens at the proxy/service, this other setup is recommended, please check it out.

If your proxy/service acts as a passthrough and the SSL termination happens at the end application itself, then please continue with the current setup.

Please note, both these setups have different docker images. In case of any queries, please reach out to us at [e-mail] .

Connecting with Akto's eBPF traffic collector is recommended mTLS systems where TLS termination occurs at application ( a system where your services are just passing the traffic directly to the application ).

For a better understanding, here's an architecture diagram of the setup.

ebpf Deployment

Adding Akto traffic collector

1. Setup Akto data processor using the guide here
2. Apply the daemonset configuration given below using kubectl apply -f akto-daemonset-config.yaml -n <NAMESPACE>. You will find AKTO_NLB_IP after setting up Akto data processor, as mentioned above.

apiVersion: apps/v1
kind: DaemonSet
metadata:
  name: akto-k8s
  namespace: {NAMESPACE}
  labels:
    app: akto-collector
spec:
  selector:
    matchLabels:
      app: akto-collector
  template:
    metadata:
      labels:
        app: akto-collector
    spec:
      hostNetwork: true
      dnsPolicy: ClusterFirstWithHostNet
      hostPID: true
      containers:
      - name: mirror-api-logging
        image: aktosecurity/mirror-api-logging:k8s_ebpf
        resources:
          limits:
            cpu: 500m
            memory: 1Gi
          requests:
            cpu: 50m
            memory: 50Mi
        env: 
          - name: AKTO_TRAFFIC_BATCH_TIME_SECS
            value: "10"
          - name: AKTO_TRAFFIC_BATCH_SIZE
            value: "100"
          - name: AKTO_KAFKA_BROKER_MAL
            value: "<AKTO_NLB_IP>:9092"
        securityContext:
          capabilities:
            add:
            - SYS_PTRACE
            - SYS_ADMIN
          privileged: true
        volumeMounts:
          # needed to load kernel headers
          - name: lib-modules
            mountPath: /lib/modules
            readOnly: true
          # needed to trace kernel events
          - name: sys-kernel
            mountPath: /sys/kernel
            readOnly: true
          # needed to trace SSL user libraries
          - name: host
            mountPath: /host
            readOnly: true
      volumes:
        - name: sys-kernel
          hostPath:
            path: /sys/kernel
        - name: lib-modules
          hostPath:
            path: /lib/modules
        - name: host
          hostPath:
            path : /

If you are on VMs or EC2s instead of a K8s cluster, you can use the following docker command to run the agent -

docker run --rm -d \
  --name mirror-api-logging \
  --network host \
  --pid host \
  --privileged \
  --cap-add SYS_PTRACE \
  --cap-add SYS_ADMIN \
  -e AKTO_TRAFFIC_BATCH_TIME_SECS=10 \
  -e AKTO_TRAFFIC_BATCH_SIZE=100 \
  -e AKTO_KAFKA_BROKER_MAL="<AKTO_NLB_IP>:9092" \
  -v /usr/src:/usr/src:ro \
  -v /lib/modules:/lib/modules:ro \
  -v /sys/kernel:/sys/kernel:ro \
  -v /:/host:ro \
  aktosecurity/mirror-api-logging:k8s_ebpf

For AKTO_NLB_IP , Use the service IP or load balancer name of Traffic Processor from step (1)

1. You can add and configure the env variables below to control the daemonset. Here's a diagram of how the module processes traffic:

eBPF Traffic Processing

# This helps in filtering traffic sent to akto, based on certain headers. Here is an example for sending traffic only for 'bookinfo' namespace in an istio setup.
- name: AKTO_MODULE_DISCOVERY_CONFIG
  value: '[{"key":{"eq":"x-forwarded-client-cert","ifAbsent":"reject"},"value":{"regex":".*bookinfo.*"}}]'
# Time limit ( in seconds ) after which, a traffic stream is processed and marked inactive. The same stream, is not processed again.
- name: TRAFFIC_INACTIVITY_THRESHOLD
  value: "30"
# Max traffic connections kept in memory 
- name: TRAFFIC_MAX_ACTIVE_CONN
  value: "4096"
# Make this flag true to disable egress traffic. It is recommended to keep this false.
- name: TRAFFIC_DISABLE_EGRESS
  value: "false"
# Max mem usage after which the pod restarts ( in MB )
- name: AKTO_MEM_THRESH_RESTART
  value: "800"
# Max limit of traffic buffer kept in memory ( in MB )
- name: TRAFFIC_BUFFER_THRESHOLD
  value: "600"
# Ignore traffic coming from unresolved IPs, i.e. requests with host header of the format <a.b.c.d>
- name: AKTO_IGNORE_IP_TRAFFIC
  value: "false"
# Ignore traffic coming from AWS cloud metadata IP
- name: AKTO_IGNORE_CLOUD_METADATA_CALLS
  value: "false"
# The interval poll ( in seconds ) in which data is sent to Akto data processor.
- name: KAFKA_POLL_INTERVAL
  value: "0.5"
# The interval poll ( in minutes ) in which the akto module scans the current running processes, to check for new SSL related processes to probe.
- name: UPROBE_POLL_INTERVAL
  value: 5
# If you only want to trace traffic for which SSL termination happens at proxy/service.
- name: CAPTURE_ALL
  value: "false"
# If you only want to trace traffic for which SSL termination happens at application. 
# Note: when CAPTURE_ALL is false and CAPTURE_SSL is true, only application traffic is captured.
- name: CAPTURE_SSL
  value: "true"

1. You can check your API inventory on Akto dashboard to see endpoints being discovered.

Notes:

1. If you're running the daemonset outside of the kubernetes system, set the env PROBE_ALL_PID as true.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

The traffic will contain a lot of sensitive data - does it leave my VPC?

Data remains strictly within your VPC. Akto doesn't take data out of your VPC at all.

Does adding DaemonSet have any impact on performance or latency?

Zero impact on latency. The DaemonSet doesn't sit like a proxy. It works on eBPF technology, which works on traces function calls at kernel level. It is very lightweight. We have benchmarked it against traffic as high as 20M API requests/min. It consumes very low resources (CPU & RAM).

I don't see my error on this list here.

Please send us all details at [e-mail] or reach out via Intercom on your Akto dashboard. We will definitely help you out.

Get Support for your Akto setup

There are multiple ways to request support from Akto. We are 24X7 available on the following:

1. In-app intercom support. Message us with your query on intercom in Akto dashboard and someone will reply.

2. Join our discord channel for community support.
3. Contact [e-mail] for email support.

4. Contact us here.