Use CIS Kubernetes Benchmark v1.5.1 policy constraints

Policy Controller comes with a default library of constraint templates that can be used with the CIS bundle to audit the compliance of your cluster against the CIS Kubernetes Benchmark v1.5.1. This benchmark is a set of recommendations for configuring Kubernetes to support a strong security posture.

This page contains instructions for manually applying a policy bundle. Alternatively, you can apply policy bundles directly.

Warning: After you choose a method to apply policy bundles (manual, gcloud CLI, or Google Cloud console), using a different method to install policy bundles can cause errors in your environment.

This page is for IT administrators and Operators who want to ensure that all resources running within the cloud platform meet organizational compliance requirements by providing and maintaining automation to audit or enforce. To learn more about common roles and example tasks that we reference in Google Cloud content, see Common GKE Enterprise user roles and tasks.

This bundle of constraints addresses and enforces policies in the following domains:

• RBAC and service accounts
• Pod Security Policies
• Network policies and CNI
• Secrets management
• General policies

Note: This bundle has not been certified by CIS.

CIS Kubernetes v1.5.1 policy bundle constraints

Constraint Name	Control Description	Control ID
cis-k8s-v1.5.1-restrict-clusteradmin-rolebindings.yaml	Restricts the use of the `cluster-admin` role	5.1.1
cis-k8s-v1.5.1-prohibit-role-wildcard-access.yaml	Restricts the use of wildcards in `Roles` and `ClusterRoles`	5.1.3
cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-privileged-container.yaml	Minimize the admission of privileged containers	5.2.1
cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-host-namespace.yaml	Minimize the admission of containers wanting to share the host process ID namespace	5.2.2
	Minimize the admission of containers wanting to share the host IPC namespace	5.2.3
cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-host-network-ports	Minimize the admission of containers wanting to share the host network namespace	5.2.4
cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-allow-privilege-escalation-container	Minimize the admission of containers with allowPrivilegeEscalation	5.2.5
cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-pods-must-run-as-nonroot	Minimize the admission of root containers	5.2.6
cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-capabilities	Minimize the admission of containers with the NET_RAW capability	5.2.7
	Minimize the admission of containers with added capabilities	5.2.8
	Minimize the admission of containers with capabilities assigned	5.2.9
cis-k8s-v1.5.1-require-namespace-network-policies	Ensure that all namespaces have Network Policies defined	5.3.2
cis-k8s-v1.5.1-no-secrets-as-env-vars	Prefer using Secrets as files over Secrets as environment variables	5.4.1
cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-seccomp-default	Ensure that the seccomp profile is set to `docker/default` in your Pod definitions	5.7.2
cis-k8s-v1.5.1-pods-require-security-context	Apply Security Context to your Pods and containers	5.7.3

Before you begin

1. Install and initialize the Google Cloud CLI, which provides the gcloud and kubectl commands used in these instructions. If you use Cloud Shell, Google Cloud CLI comes pre-installed.
2. Install Policy Controller on your cluster with the default library of constraint templates. You must also enable support for referential constraints, as this bundle contains referential constraints.

Configure Policy Controller for referential constraints

Warning: You can overwrite your changes. If you already have an existing Config in the gatekeeper-system namespace, you must include all previous customization settings to preserve your changes.

1. Save the following YAML manifest to a file as policycontroller-config.yaml. The manifest configures Policy Controller to watch specific kinds of objects.

   apiVersion: config.gatekeeper.sh/v1alpha1
   kind: Config
   metadata:
     name: config
     namespace: "gatekeeper-system"
   spec:
     sync:
       syncOnly:
         - group: ""
           version: "v1"
           kind: "Namespace"
         - group: "networking.k8s.io"
           version: "v1"
           kind: "NetworkPolicy"
   

2. Apply the policycontroller-config.yaml manifest:

   kubectl apply -f policycontroller-config.yaml
   

Audit CIS Kubernetes v1.5.1 policy bundle

Policy Controller lets you enforce policies for your Kubernetes cluster. To help test your workloads and their compliance with regard to the CIS policies outlined in the preceding table, you can deploy these constraints in "audit" mode to reveal violations and more importantly give yourself a chance to fix them before enforcing on your Kubernetes cluster.

You can apply these policies with spec.enforcementAction set to dryrun using kubectl, kpt, or Config Sync.

kubectl

1. (Optional) Preview the policy constraints with kubectl:

   kubectl kustomize https://github.com/GoogleCloudPlatform/gke-policy-library.git/bundles/cis-k8s-v1.5.1
   

2. Apply the policy constraints with kubectl:

   kubectl apply -k https://github.com/GoogleCloudPlatform/gke-policy-library.git/bundles/cis-k8s-v1.5.1
   

   The output is the following:

   k8snoenvvarsecrets.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-no-secrets-as-env-vars created
   k8spspallowprivilegeescalationcontainer.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-allow-privilege-escalation created
   k8spspallowedusers.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-pods-must-run-as-nonroot created
   k8spspcapabilities.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-capabilities created
   k8spsphostnamespace.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-host-namespace created
   k8spsphostnetworkingports.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-host-network-ports created
   k8spspprivilegedcontainer.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-privileged-container created
   k8spspseccomp.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-seccomp-default created
   k8spodsrequiresecuritycontext.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-pods-require-security-context created
   k8sprohibitrolewildcardaccess.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-prohibit-role-wildcard-access created
   k8srequirenamespacenetworkpolicies.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-require-namespace-network-policies created
   k8srestrictrolebindings.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-restrict-clusteradmin-rolebindings created
   

3. Verify that policy constraints have been installed and check if violations exist across the cluster:

   kubectl get -k https://github.com/GoogleCloudPlatform/gke-policy-library.git/bundles/cis-k8s-v1.5.1
   

   The output is similar to the following:

   NAME                                                                                 ENFORCEMENT-ACTION   TOTAL-VIOLATIONS
   k8snoenvvarsecrets.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-no-secrets-as-env-vars   dryrun               0
   
   NAME                                                                                                              ENFORCEMENT-ACTION   TOTAL-VIOLATIONS
   k8spspallowprivilegeescalationcontainer.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-allow-privilege-escalation   dryrun               0
   
   NAME                                                                                       ENFORCEMENT-ACTION   TOTAL-VIOLATIONS
   k8spspallowedusers.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-pods-must-run-as-nonroot   dryrun               0
   
   NAME                                                                           ENFORCEMENT-ACTION   TOTAL-VIOLATIONS
   k8spspcapabilities.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-capabilities   dryrun               0
   
   NAME                                                                              ENFORCEMENT-ACTION   TOTAL-VIOLATIONS
   k8spsphostnamespace.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-host-namespace   dryrun               0
   
   NAME                                                                                        ENFORCEMENT-ACTION   TOTAL-VIOLATIONS
   k8spsphostnetworkingports.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-host-network-ports   dryrun               0
   
   NAME                                                                                          ENFORCEMENT-ACTION   TOTAL-VIOLATIONS
   k8spspprivilegedcontainer.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-privileged-container   dryrun               0
   
   NAME                                                                         ENFORCEMENT-ACTION   TOTAL-VIOLATIONS
   k8spspseccomp.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-seccomp-default   dryrun               0
   
   NAME                                                                                                   ENFORCEMENT-ACTION   TOTAL-VIOLATIONS
   k8spodsrequiresecuritycontext.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-pods-require-security-context   dryrun               0
   
   NAME                                                                                                   ENFORCEMENT-ACTION   TOTAL-VIOLATIONS
   k8sprohibitrolewildcardaccess.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-prohibit-role-wildcard-access   dryrun               0
   
   NAME                                                                                                             ENFORCEMENT-ACTION   TOTAL-VIOLATIONS
   k8srequirenamespacenetworkpolicies.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-require-namespace-network-policies   dryrun               0
   
   NAME                                                                                                  ENFORCEMENT-ACTION   TOTAL-VIOLATIONS
   k8srestrictrolebindings.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-restrict-clusteradmin-rolebindings   dryrun               0
   

kpt

1. Install and setup kpt. kpt is used in these instructions to customize and deploy Kubernetes resources.

2. Download the CIS policy bundle from GitHub using kpt:

   kpt pkg get https://github.com/GoogleCloudPlatform/gke-policy-library.git/bundles/cis-k8s-v1.5.1
   

3. Run the set-enforcement-action kpt function to set the policies' enforcement action to dryrun:

   kpt fn eval cis-k8s-v1.5.1 -i gcr.io/kpt-fn/set-enforcement-action:v0.1 \
     -- enforcementAction=dryrun
   

4. Initialize the working directory with kpt, which creates a resource to track changes:

   cd cis-k8s-v1.5.1
   kpt live init
   

5. Apply the policy constraints with kpt:

   kpt live apply
   

   The output is the following:

   k8spspseccomp.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/psp-seccomp-docker-default created
   k8spodsrequiresecuritycontext.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/pods-require-security-context created
   k8sprohibitrolewildcardaccess.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/prohibit-role-wildcard-access created
   k8srequirenamespacenetworkpolicies.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/require-namespace-network-policies created
   k8snoenvvarsecrets.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/no-secrets-as-env-vars created
   k8spspallowprivilegeescalationcontainer.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/psp-allow-privilege-escalation-container created
   k8spspallowedusers.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/psp-pods-must-run-as-nonroot created
   k8spsphostnetworkingports.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/psp-host-network-ports created
   k8srestrictrolebindings.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/restrict-clusteradmin-rolebindings created
   k8spspcapabilities.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/psp-capabilities created
   k8spsphostnamespace.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/psp-host-namespace created
   k8spspprivilegedcontainer.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/psp-privileged-container created
   13 resource(s) applied. 13 created, 0 unchanged, 0 configured, 0 failed
   

6. Verify that policy constraints have been installed and check if violations exist across the cluster:

   kpt live status --output table --poll-until current
   

   A status of CURRENT confirms successful installation of the constraints.

Config Sync

1. Install and setup kpt. kpt is used in these instructions to customize and deploy Kubernetes resources.

Operators using Config Sync to deploy policies to their clusters can use the following instructions:

1. Change into the sync directory for Config Sync:

   cd SYNC_ROOT_DIR
   

   Note: Kpt v1.0.0-beta.17 and later automatically create a resourcegroup.yaml file during live init which shouldn't be checked into your Config Sync repo. If not already present, add resourcegroup.yaml to your repo's .gitignore file.

   To create or append .gitignore with resourcegroup.yaml:

   echo resourcegroup.yaml >> .gitignore
   

2. Create a dedicated policies directory:

   mkdir -p policies
   

3. Download the CIS policy bundle from GitHub using kpt:

   kpt pkg get https://github.com/GoogleCloudPlatform/gke-policy-library.git/bundles/cis-k8s-v1.5.1 policies/cis-k8s-v1.5.1
   

4. Run the set-enforcement-action kpt function to set the policies' enforcement action to dryrun:

   kpt fn eval policies/cis-k8s-v1.5.1 -i gcr.io/kpt-fn/set-enforcement-action:v0.1 -- enforcementAction=dryrun
   

5. (Optional) Preview the policy constraints to be created:

   kpt live init policies/cis-k8s-v1.5.1
   kpt live apply --dry-run policies/cis-k8s-v1.5.1
   

   The output is the following:

   Dry-run strategy: client
   inventory update started
   inventory update finished
   apply phase started
   k8snoenvvarsecrets.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-no-secrets-as-env-vars apply successful
   k8spspallowprivilegeescalationcontainer.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-allow-privilege-escalation apply successful
   k8spspallowedusers.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-pods-must-run-as-nonroot apply successful
   k8spspcapabilities.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-capabilities apply successful
   k8spsphostnamespace.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-host-namespace apply successful
   k8spsphostnetworkingports.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-host-network-ports apply successful
   k8spspprivilegedcontainer.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-privileged-container apply successful
   k8spspseccomp.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-seccomp-default apply successful
   k8spodsrequiresecuritycontext.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-pods-require-security-context apply successful
   k8sprohibitrolewildcardaccess.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-prohibit-role-wildcard-access apply successful
   k8srequirenamespacenetworkpolicies.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-require-namespace-network-policies apply successful
   k8srestrictrolebindings.constraints.gatekeeper.sh/cis-k8s-v1.5.1-restrict-clusteradmin-rolebindings apply successful
   apply phase finished
   inventory update started
   inventory update finished
   apply result: 12 attempted, 12 successful, 0 skipped, 0 failed
   

6. If your sync directory for Config Sync uses Kustomize, add policies/cis-k8s-v1.5.1 to your root kustomization.yaml. Otherwise remove the policies/cis-k8s-v1.5.1/kustomization.yaml file:

   rm SYNC_ROOT_DIR/policies/cis-k8s-v1.5.1/kustomization.yaml
   

7. Push changes to the Config Sync repo:

   git add SYNC_ROOT_DIR/policies/cis-k8s-v1.5.1
   git commit -m 'Adding CIS policy audit enforcement'
   git push
   

8. Verify the status of the installation:

   watch gcloud beta container fleet config-management status --project PROJECT_ID
   

   A status of SYNCED confirms the installation of the policies.

View policy violations

Once the policy constraints are installed in audit mode, violations on the cluster can be viewed in the UI using the Policy Controller Dashboard.

You can also use kubectl to view violations on the cluster using the following command:

kubectl get constraint -l policycontroller.gke.io/bundleName=cis-k8s-v1.5.1 -o json | jq -cC '.items[]| [.metadata.name,.status.totalViolations]'

If violations are present, a listing of the violation messages per constraint can be viewed with:

kubectl get constraint -l policycontroller.gke.io/bundleName=cis-k8s-v1.5.1 -o json | jq -C '.items[]| select(.status.totalViolations>0)| [.metadata.name,.status.violations[]?]'

Change CIS Kubernetes v1.5.1 policy bundle enforcement action

Once you've reviewed policy violations on your cluster, you can consider changing the enforcement mode so the Admission Controller will either warn on or even deny block non-compliant resource from getting applied to the cluster.

Warning: The deny enforcement action should be used with care as it can potentially block required changes resulting in interruption to critical workloads or the cluster. It is strongly recommended that only the warn or dryrun enforcement actions are used on clusters with production workloads, when testing new constraints, or performing migrations such as upgrading platforms. For more information about enforcement actions, see Auditing using constraints.

kubectl

1. Use kubectl to set the policies' enforcement action to warn:

   kubectl get constraint -l policycontroller.gke.io/bundleName=cis-k8s-v1.5.1 -o name | xargs -I {} kubectl patch {} --type='json' -p='[{"op":"replace","path":"/spec/enforcementAction","value":"warn"}]'
   

2. Verify that policy constraints enforcement action have been updated:

   kubectl get constraint -l policycontroller.gke.io/bundleName=cis-k8s-v1.5.1
   

kpt

1. Run the set-enforcement-action kpt function to set the policies' enforcement action to warn:

   kpt fn eval -i gcr.io/kpt-fn/set-enforcement-action:v0.1 -- enforcementAction=warn
   

2. Apply the policy constraints:

   kpt live apply
   

Config Sync

Operators using Config Sync to deploy policies to their clusters can use the following instructions:

1. Change into the sync directory for Config Sync:

   cd SYNC_ROOT_DIR
   

2. Run the set-enforcement-action kpt function to set the policies' enforcement action to warn:

   kpt fn eval policies/cis-k8s-v1.5.1 -i gcr.io/kpt-fn/set-enforcement-action:v0.1 -- enforcementAction=warn
   

3. Push changes to the Config Sync repo:

   git add SYNC_ROOT_DIR/policies/cis-k8s-v1.5.1
   git commit -m 'Adding CIS Kubernetes v1.5.1 policy bundle warn enforcement'
   git push
   

4. Verify the status of the installation:

   nomos status
   

   The cluster should display a status of SYNCED with the installed policies.

Test policy enforcement

Create a non-compliant resource on the cluster using the following command:

cat <<EOF | kubectl apply -f -
apiVersion: v1
kind: Pod
metadata:
  namespace: default
  name: wp-non-compliant
  labels:
    app: wordpress
spec:
  containers:
    - image: wordpress
      name: wordpress
      ports:
      - containerPort: 80
        name: wordpress
EOF

The admission controller should produce a warning listing out the policy violations that this resource violates, as shown in the following example:

Warning: [cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-pods-must-run-as-nonroot] Container wordpress is attempting to run without a required securityContext/runAsNonRoot or securityContext/runAsUser != 0
Warning: [cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-allow-privilege-escalation] Privilege escalation container is not allowed: wordpress
Warning: [cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-seccomp-default] Seccomp profile 'not configured' is not allowed for container 'wordpress'. Found at: no explicit profile found. Allowed profiles: {"RuntimeDefault", "docker/default", "runtime/default"}
Warning: [cis-k8s-v1.5.1-psp-capabilities] container <wordpress> is not dropping all required capabilities. Container must drop all of ["NET_RAW"] or "ALL"
Warning: [cis-k8s-v1.5.1-pods-require-security-context] securityContext must be defined for all Pod containers
pod/wp-non-compliant created

Remove CIS Kubernetes v1.5.1 policy bundle

If needed, the CIS K8s policy bundle can be removed from the cluster.

kubectl

Use kubectl to remove the policies:

  kubectl delete constraint -l policycontroller.gke.io/bundleName=cis-k8s-v1.5.1
  

kpt

Remove the policies:

  kpt live destroy
  

Config Sync

Operators using Config Sync to deploy policies to their clusters can use the following instructions:

1. Push changes to the Config Sync repo:

   git rm -r SYNC_ROOT_DIR/policies/cis-k8s-v1.5.1
   git commit -m 'Removing CIS policies'
   git push
   

2. Verify the status:

   nomos status
   

   The cluster should display a status of SYNCED with the resources removed.