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US 10,255,089 B2Granted
Self-deleting virtual machines
AssigneeCA, Inc.
InventorGirish Anantharaju
Life of this patent
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Abstract
Securing a virtual machine to be executed on a host machine is accomplished by authenticating, by the virtual machine during an initial boot routine, an identity of the host machine. If the identity does not match a predetermined value, then authenticating the identity of the host machine fails and data associated with the virtual machine is deleted.
Claims20
A method of securing a virtual machine to be executed on a physical host machine, comprising:
- authenticating, by the virtual machine executing on the physical host machine, following boot up of an operating system executing on the physical host machine, an identity of the physical host machine utilizing an initial boot routine of the virtual machine;
- wherein the virtual machine executes within a virtual environment provided by a hypervisor operating within the operating system executing on the physical host machine,
- wherein the virtual machine comprises a shell portion and a secure portion, and
- wherein the initial boot routine comprises the shell portion of the virtual machine accessing initial boot sectors of a first virtual hard drive associated with the shell portion;
- querying, by the virtual machine executing on the physical host machine, the hypervisor for the identity of the physical host machine;
- and
- deleting, by the virtual machine executing on the physical host machine, first data on a second virtual hard drive associated with the secure portion of the virtual machine, when authenticating the identity of the physical host machine fails.
4 more elements
A computer program product for securing a virtual machine to be executed on a physical host machine, comprising:
- a non-transitory computer readable storage medium having computer readable program code embodied therewith, the computer readable program code comprising:
- computer readable program code configured to authenticate an identity of the physical host machine utilizing an initial boot routine of the virtual machine following boot up of an operating system executing on the physical host machine;
- wherein the virtual machine executes within a virtual environment provided by a hypervisor operating within the operating system executing on the physical host machine,
- wherein the virtual machine comprises a shell portion and a secure portion, and
- wherein the initial boot routine comprises the shell portion of the virtual machine accessing initial boot sectors of a first virtual hard drive associated with the shell portion;
- computer readable program code configured to query the hypervisor for the identity of the physical host machine;
- and
- computer readable program code configured to delete first data on a second virtual hard drive associated with the secure portion of the virtual machine, when the identity does not match a predetermined value.
5 more elements
A system comprising:
- a processor coupled with a memory;
- said memory comprising code executable by the processor, said code configured, when executed, to implement a secure virtual machine;
- the secure virtual machine comprising:
- a shell portion and a secure portion;
- an initial boot routine configured to authenticate an identity of a physical host machine following boot up of an operating system executing on the physical host machine;
- wherein the secure virtual machine executes within a virtual environment provided by a hypervisor operating within operating system executing on the physical host machine;
- and
- wherein the initial boot routine comprises the shell portion of the virtual machine accessing initial boot sectors of a first virtual hard drive associated with the shell portion;
- a query portion of the initial boot routine configured to query the hypervisor for the identity of the physical host machine;
- and
- a security portion of the initial boot routine configured to delete first data on a second virtual hard drive associated with the secure portion of the secure virtual machine, when the identity does not match a predetermined value.
8 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.