Binding a trusted virtual machine to a trusted host computer
AssigneeVMware, Inc.
InventorsSamyuktha Subramanian, Daniel Muller, Mukund Gunti, Adrian Drzewiecki
Life of this patent
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Abstract
An example method of authenticating software executing in a computer system includes verifying first software executing on the computer system, the software including a hypervisor, verifying second software executing in a virtual machine (VM) managed by the hypervisor, generating a binding key having public and private portions, signing an object to identifies the VM using the private portion of the binding key, and verifying a signature of the object using a public portion of the binding key.
Claims20
A method of authenticating software executing in a computer system, comprising:
- verifying first software executing on the computer system, the first software including a hypervisor;
- verifying second software executing in a virtual machine (VM) managed by the hypervisor,
- generating a binding key having a public portion and a private portion;
- signing an object that identifies the VM using the private portion of the binding key, wherein the object is a checksum of indicia associated with the VM;
- and
- verifying a signature of the object using the public portion of the binding key.
A non-transitory computer readable medium having instructions stored thereon that when executed by a processor cause the processor to perform a method of authenticating software executing in a computer system, comprising:
- verifying first software executing on the computer system, the first software including a hypervisor;
- verifying second software executing in a virtual machine (VM) managed by the hypervisor;
- generating a binding key having a public portion and a private portion;
- signing an object that identifies the VM using the private portion of the binding key, wherein the object is a checksum of indicia associated with the VM;
- and
- verifying a signature of the object using the public portion of the binding key.
A computer system, comprising:
- a hardware platform including a processor and memory;
- and
- a software platform executing on the hardware platform, the software platform configured to perform authentication of software executing in a computer system by:
- verifying first software executing on the computer system, the first software including a hypervisor;
- verifying second software executing in a virtual machine (VM) managed by the hypervisor;
- generating a binding key having a public portion and a private portion;
- signing an object that identifies the VM using the private portion of the binding key, wherein the object is a checksum of indicia associated with the VM;
- and
- verifying a signature of the object using the public portion of the binding key.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.