Living on the Edge: eBPF Defenses for Embedded System (in the Automotive Domain)

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Presented at DeepSec 2024 by

Reinhard Kugler

Linux has become a driving factor in the industrial and automotive domain. Vehicles are already a complex network of electrical components. In recent years the technology stack and connectivity of vehicles have drastically evolved. Is all this complexity still safe and secure? How can embedded systems running different bus systems and physical interfaces be protected against modern attackers? The now mandatory updates of on-board components in these vehicles have introduced even new security challenges to this evolving landscape. Common Linux security measures, including capabilities, permissions, and mandatory access control, are already hitting their limits. The use of eBPF technologies promises a flexible way to define security at runtime without the need to change the application code. Will this be as transformative for the embedded sector as it has been for the cloud? This talk presents hands-on the internals of embedded security and shows how eBPF can be employed for defenses on automotive and embedded systems running Linux.