Supporting migration of virtual machines containing enclaves

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-11327782-B2
Application number	US-201916561051-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Sep 5, 2019
Priority date	Jul 19, 2019
Publication date	May 10, 2022
Grant date	May 10, 2022

Abstract

The present disclosure provides an approach for migrating the contents of an enclave, together with a virtual machine comprising the enclave, from a source host to a destination host. The approach provides a technique that allows the contents of the enclave to remain secure during the migration process, and also allows the destination host to decrypt the contents of the enclave upon receiving the contents and upon receiving the VM that includes the enclave. The approach allows for the VM to continue execution on the destination host. The enclave retains its state from source host to destination host. Applications using the enclave in the source host are able to continue using the enclave on the destination host using the data migrated from the source host to the destination host.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method of migrating a virtual machine (VM) from a first host to a second host, the VM comprising a first enclave within a memory of the first host, the VM further comprising an application running within the VM, the VM running on a virtualization software that abstracts hardware of the first host, the method comprising:
calling, by the application, an eviction entry point located within the first enclave, wherein the calling comprises providing an identifier associated with the second host to the eviction entry point;
requesting, by the eviction entry point, an encryption key from a key management service, wherein requesting the encryption key comprises providing the identifier associated with the second host to the key management service;
encrypting, by the eviction entry point, persistent data of the first enclave using the encryption key requested from the key management service;
placing the encrypted persistent data outside of the first enclave;
migrating the VM and the encrypted persistent data to the second host;
creating a second enclave within the second host;
requesting, by a restoration entry point located within the second enclave, a decryption key from the key management service based on the identifier associated with the second host;
decrypting, by the restoration entry point located within the second enclave, the encrypted persistent data using the decryption key requested from the key management service; and
adding to the second enclave, by the restoration entry point, the decrypted persistent data.

2. The method of claim 1 , the method further comprising:
notifying the application, by the virtualization software, of initiation of a migration process of the VM; and
based at least in part on the notifying, performing the calling, by the application, of the eviction entry point located within the first enclave.

3. The method of claim 2 , wherein the second host comprises a second virtualization software, the method further comprising:
notifying the application, by the second virtualization software, of completion of the migration process of the VM; and
based at least in part on the notifying, performing the creating the second enclave within the second host.

4. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
determining by the application that the first enclave is a stateful enclave; and
based at least in part on the determining, performing the calling, by the application, the eviction entry point located within the first enclave.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein the key management service is executing on a third host.

6. A non-transitory computer readable medium comprising instructions to be executed in a processor of a computer system, the instructions when executed in the processor cause the computer system to carry out a method of migrating a virtual machine (VM) from a first host to a second host, the VM comprising a first enclave within a memory of the first host, the VM further comprising an application running within the VM, the VM running on a virtualization software that abstracts hardware of the first host, the method comprising:
calling, by the application, an eviction entry point located within the first enclave, wherein the calling comprises providing an identifier associated with the second host to the eviction entry point;
requesting, by the eviction entry point, an encryption key from a key management service, wherein requesting the encryption key comprises providing the identifier associated with the second host to the key management service;
encrypting, by the eviction entry point, persistent data of the first enclave using the encryption key requested from the key management service;
placing the encrypted persistent data outside of the first enclave;
migrating the VM and the encrypted persistent data to the second host;
creating a second enclave within the second host;
requesting, by a restoration entry point located within the second enclave, a decryption key from the key management service based on the identifier associated with the second host;
decrypting, by the restoration entry point located within the second enclave, the encrypted persistent data using the decryption key requested from the key management service; and
adding to the second enclave, by the restoration entry point, the decrypted persistent data.

7. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 6 , the method further comprising:
notifying the application, by the virtualization software, of initiation of a migration process of the VM; and
based at least in part on the notifying, performing the calling, by the application, of the eviction entry point located within the first enclave.

8. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 7 , wherein the second host comprises a second virtualization software, the method further comprising:
notifying the application, by the second virtualization software, of completion of the migration process of the VM; and
based at least in part on the notifying, performing the creating the second enclave within the second host.

9. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 6 , wherein the method further comprises:
determining by the application that the first enclave is a stateful enclave; and
based at least in part on the determining, performing the calling, by the application, the eviction entry point located within the first enclave.

10. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 6 , wherein the key management service is executing on a third host.

11. A computer system comprising:
a first host comprising a memory, a virtualization software, a hardware, and a virtual machine (VM);
a second host; and
at least one processor, wherein the at least one processor is programmed to carry out a method of migrating the VM from the first host to the second host, the VM comprising a first enclave within the memory of the first host, the VM further comprising an application running within the VM, the VM running on the virtualization software that abstracts the hardware of the first host, the method comprising:
calling, by the application, an eviction entry point located within the first enclave, wherein the calling comprises providing an identifier associated with the second host to the eviction entry point;
requesting, by the eviction entry point, an encryption key from a key management service, wherein requesting the encryption key comprises providing the identifier associated with the second host to the key management service;
encrypting, by the eviction entry point, persistent data of the first enclave using the encryption key requested from the key management service;
placing the encrypted persistent data outside of the first enclave;
migrating the VM and the encrypted persistent data to the second host;
creating a second enclave within the second host;
requesting, by a restoration entry point located within the second enclave, a decryption key from the key management service based on the identifier associated with the second host;
decrypting, by the restoration entry point located within the second enclave, the encrypted persistent data using the decryption key requested from the key management service; and
adding to the second enclave, by the restoration entry point, the decrypted persistent data.

12. The computer system of claim 11 , the method further comprising:
notifying the application, by the virtualization software, of initiation of a migration process of the VM; and
based at least in part on the notifying, performing the calling, by the application, of the eviction entry point located within the first enclave.

Assignees

• Vmware Inc

Inventors

• Kataria Alok Nemchand
• Carbone Martim
• Shah Deep

Classifications

• G06F9/455

  Emulation; Interpretation; Software simulation, e.g. virtualisation or emulation of application or operating system execution engines · CPC title

• G06F2009/4557

  Distribution of virtual machine instances; Migration and load balancing · CPC title

• G06F11/1438

  Restarting or rejuvenating · CPC title

• G06F2009/45587

  Isolation or security of virtual machine instances · CPC title

• H04L9/0894

  Escrow, recovery or storing of secret information, e.g. secret key escrow or cryptographic key storage · CPC title