Enhancing container security by performing container vulnerability reduction based on static and dynamic analysis of dynamically loaded symbols and system call blocking

Abstract

Systems and methods for enhancing container security are provided by reducing the attack surface. In one example, the exposure of containers to potential security vulnerabilities is reduced by identifying dynamically loaded symbols by an application via performance of static symbol analysis by examining a section of an executable to identify dynamically loaded symbols corresponding to functions contained within shared libraries. Based on a given shared library's usage of functions within standard libraries and a known mapping between functions of standard libraries and system calls, those system calls potentially accessed by the application may be identified and a security policy may be generated and configured for enforcement by a kernel security module to limit system call usage accordingly. Thereafter, the security policy enforced by the kernel security module may be refined based on performance of dynamic symbol analysis to identify system calls that are actually called by the application during runtime.