Hello,
I have a use-case for authentication of Linux cifs client mounts without the user being present (e.g. from batch jobs) using gssproxy's impersonation feature with Kerberos Constrained Delegation similar to how it can be done for NFS[1].
My understanding is that currently neither the Linux cifs kernel client nor cifs-utils userland tools support acquiring credentials using gssproxy. The former uses a custom upcall interface to talk to cifs.spnego from cifs-utils. The latter then goes looking for Kerberos ticket caches using libkrb5 functions, not GSSAPI, which prevents gssproxy from interacting with it.[2]
From what I understand, the preferred method would be to switch the Linux kernel client upcall to the RPC protocol defined by gssproxy[3] (as has been done for the Linux kernel NFS server already replacing rpc.svcgssd[4]). The kernel could then, at least optionally, talk to gssproxy directly to try and obtain credentials.
Failing that, cifs-utils' cifs.spnego could be switched to GSSAPI so that gssproxy's interposer plugin could intercept GSSAPI calls and provide them with the required credentials (similar to the NFS client rpc.gssd[5]).
Assuming my understanding is correct so far:
Is anyone doing any work on this and could use some help (testing, coding)?
What would be expected complexity and possible roadblocks when trying to make a start at implementing this?
Or is the idea moot due to some constraint or recent development I'm not aware of?
I have found a recent discussion of the topic on linux-cifs[6] which provided no definite answer though.
As a crude attempt at an explicit userspace workaround I tried but failed to trick smbclient into initialising a ticket cache using gssproxy for cifs.spnego to find later on.
Is this something that could be implemented without too much redundant effort (or should already work, perhaps using a different tool)?
[1] https://github.com/gssapi/gssproxy/blob/main/docs/NFS.md#user-impersonation…
[2] https://pagure.io/gssproxy/issue/56
[3] https://github.com/gssapi/gssproxy/blob/main/docs/ProtocolDocumentation.md
[4] https://github.com/gssapi/gssproxy/blob/main/docs/NFS.md#nfs-server
[5] https://github.com/gssapi/gssproxy/blob/main/docs/NFS.md#nfs-client
[6] https://www.spinics.net/lists/linux-cifs/msg20182.html
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Thanks,
Michael
Branch: refs/heads/main
Home: https://github.com/gssapi/gssproxy
Commit: 856b2b6a7a96e4ff319d5ea8c21f95937f461f2e
https://github.com/gssapi/gssproxy/commit/856b2b6a7a96e4ff319d5ea8c21f95937…
Author: jacobshivers <93015798+jacobshivers(a)users.noreply.github.com>
Date: 2021-10-26 (Tue, 26 Oct 2021)
Changed paths:
M Makefile.am
M contrib/gssproxy.spec.in
A docs/network_fs_clients.md
A examples/99-network-fs-clients.conf.in
R examples/99-nfs-client.conf.in
Log Message:
-----------
Generalize nfs config file example
Update and rename 99-nfs-client.conf.in to 99-network-fs-clients.conf.in
Generalized name as this file can be used by both NFS and SMB upcall
methods, i.e. rpc.gssd and cifs.upcall respectively.
Create network_fs_clients.md. The file describes steps to have
differentiated access methods for client side NFS and SMB if needed.
Modified Makefile.am and contrib/gssproxy.spec.in for instances of
99-nfs-client.conf to 99-network-fs-clients.conf.
Signed-off-by: Jacob Shivers <jshivers(a)redhat.com>