DOCA Documentation v1.3

Firewall

NVIDIA DOCA Firewall Application Guide

This document provides an example of firewall implementation on top of NVIDIA® BlueField® DPU.

A firewall application is a network security application that leverages the DPU's hardware capability to monitor incoming and outgoing network traffic and allow or block packets based on a set of preconfigured rules.

The firewall application is based on DOCA Flow gRPC, used for remote programming of the DPU's hardware. The firewall can operate in two modes:

  • Static mode – the firmware application gets 5-tuple traffic from the user with a JSON file for packets to be dropped. The packets that do not match any of the 5-tuple are forwarded by a hairpin pipe.
  • Interactive mode – the user can add rules from the command line in real time to execute different firewall rules

The firewall application is designed to run on the host and to use DOCA Flow gRPC client to send instructions to a server that runs on the BlueField DPU instance. The DPU intercepts ingress traffic from the wire and either drops it or forwards it to the egress port using a hairpin. The decision is made using traffic classification.

system-design-diagram.png

The firewall runs on top of DOCA Flow gRPC to classify packets.

application-architecture-diagram.png

3.1. Static Mode

static-mode-diagram.png

  1. The firewall application builds 3 pipes for each port (two drop pipes and a hairpin pipe).
  2. The drop pipes match only 5-tuple traffic with specific source and destination IPs and source and destination ports. One of the drop pipes matches TCP traffic and the other matches UDP. The hairpin pipe matches every packet (no misses). The drop pipes serve as root pipes and the hairpin pipe serves as a forwarding miss component to the drop pipe. Therefore, every received packet is checked first against the drop pipes. If there is a match, then it is dropped, otherwise, it is forwarded to the hairpin pipe and is then matched.

3.2. Interactive Mode

Running in interactive mode initializes 2 ports, and the user then configures the pipes and entries.

  • When adding a pipe or an entry, one must run commands to create the relevant structs beforehand
  • Optional parameters must be specified by the user in the command line. Otherwise, NULL is used.
  • After a pipe or an entry is created successfully, the relevant ID is printed for future use

Available commands:

  • create pipe port_id=[port_id][,<optional_parameters>]
    • Available optional parameters: name=<pipe-name>, root_enable=[1|0], monitor=[1|0], match_mask=[1|0], fwd=[1|0], fwd_miss=[1|0],type=[basic|control]
  • add entry pipe_id=<pipe_id>,pipe_queue=<pipe_queue>[,<optional_parameters>]
    • Available optional parameters: monitor=[1|0], fwd=[1|0]
  • add control_pipe entry priority=[priority],pipe_id=<pipe_id>,pipe_queue=<pipe_queue>[,<optional_parameters>]
    • Available optional parameters: match_mask=[1|0], fwd=[1|0]
  • destroy pipe port_id=[port_id],pipe_id=<pipe_id>
  • rm entry pipe_queue=<pipe_queue>,entry_id=[entry_id]
  • port pipes flush port_id=[port_id]
  • port pipes dump port_id=[port_id],file=[file_name]
  • create [struct] [field=value,…]
    • Struct options: pipe_match, entry_match, match_mask, actions, monitor, fwd, fwd_miss
      • Match struct fields:
        Fields Field Options
        flags  
        out_src_mac  
        out_dst_mac  
        out_eth_type  
        out_vlan_id  
        out_src_ip_type ipv4, ipv6
        out_src_ip_addr  
        out_dst_ip_type ipv4, ipv6
        out_dst_ip_addr  
        out_l4_type tcp, udp
        out_tcp_flags FIN, SYN, RST, PSH, ACK, URG, ECE, CWR
        out_src_port  
        out_dst_port  
        tun_type  
        vxlan-tun_id  
        gre_key  
        gtp_teid  
        in_src_mac  
        in_dst_mac  
        in_eth_type  
        in_vlan_id  
        in_src_ip_type ipv4, ipv6
        in_src_ip_addr  
        in_dst_ip_type ipv4, ipv6
        in_dst_ip_addr  
        in_l4_type tcp, udp
        in_tcp_flags FIN, SYN, RST, PSH, ACK, URG, ECE, CWR
        in_src_port  
        in_dst_port  

      • Actions struct fields:
        Fields Field Options
        decap true, false
        mod_src_mac  
        mod_dst_mac  
        mod_src_ip_type ipv4, ipv6
        mod_src_ip_addr  
        mod_dst_ip_type ipv4, ipv6
        mod_dst_ip_addr  
        mod_src_port  
        mod_dst_port  
        dec_ttl true, false
        has_encap true, false
        encap_src_mac  
        encap_dst_mac  
        encap_src_ip_type ipv4, ipv6
        encap_src_ip_addr  
        encap_dst_ip_type ipv4, ipv6
        encap_dst_ip_addr  
        encap_tup_type vxlan, gtpu, gre
        encap_vxlan-tun_id  
        encap_gre_key  
        encap_gtp_teid  

      • FWD struct fields:
        Fields Field Options
        type rss, port, pipe, drop
        rss_flags  
        rss_queues  
        num_of_queues  
        rss_mark  
        port_id  
        next_pipe_id  

      • Monitor struct fields:
        • flags
        • id
        • cir
        • cbs
        • aging

The following is an example for creating a pipe and adding an entry:

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create pipe_match out_l4_type=udp,out_src_ip_type=ipv4,out_src_ip_addr=0xffffffff,out_dst_ip_type=ipv4,out_dst_ip_addr=0xffffffff create fwd type=drop create fwd_miss type=pipe,next_pipe_id=1 create pipe port_id=0,name=drop,root_enable=1,fwd=1,fwd_miss=1 create pipe succeed with pipe id: 2 create entry_match out_src_ip_type=ipv4,out_src_ip_addr=10.1.20.208,out_dst_ip_type=ipv4,out_dst_ip_addr=10.1.3.216 add entry pipe_id=2,pipe_queue=0 add entry succeed with entry id: 0

This application leverages the DOCA Flow library.

  1. Parse application argument.
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    doca_argp_init();

    1. Initialize the arg parser resources.
    2. Register DOCA general flags.
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      register_firewall_params();

    3. Register firewall application params.
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      doca_argp_start();

    4. Parse application flags.
  2. Firewall initialization.
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    firewall_ports_init();

    1. Create a new gRPC channel and initialize a stub.
    2. Initialize DOCA Flow and DOCA Flow ports.
  3. Configure firewall rules.
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    url_filter_init();

    • When opearting in static mode:
      1. Initialize drop packets array from the input JSON file.
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        init_drop_packets();

      2. Create hairpin pipe for both ports. This pipe includes one entry that matches every type of packet (no misses) which is then forwarded to the egress port through a hairpin.
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        firewall_pipes_init();

      3. Creates TCP and UDP drop pipes that serve as root pipes for both ports. The built pipes have a 5-tuple match and entries from the processed JSON file that are dropped. In addition, the hairpin pipe serves as forwarding if the drop entries do not match.
    • When opearting in interactive mode:
      1. Initialize the firewall's interactive command line.
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        interactive_cmdline();

      2. Free allocated resources.
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        interactive_mode_cleanup();

  1. Refer to the following documents:
  2. The firewall example binary is located under /opt/mellanox/doca/applications/url_filter/bin/doca_url_filter.
    Note:

    Before building the application, make sure that gRPC support is enabled. Set the enable_grpc_support flag in /opt/mellanox/doca/applications/meson_option.txt to true.

    To build all the applications together, run:
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    cd /opt/mellanox/doca/applications/ meson build ninja -C build


  3. To build the firewall application only:
    1. Edit the following flags in /opt/mellanox/doca/applications/meson_option.txt:
      • Set enable_all_applications to false
      • Set enable_firewall to true
    2. Run the commands in step 2.

    Application usage:

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    Usage: doca_firewall [DOCA Flags] [Program Flags] DOCA Flags: -h, --help Print a help synopsis -v, --version Print program version information -l, --log-level Set the log level for the app <CRITICAL=0, DEBUG=4> --grpc-address ip_address[:port] Set the IP address for the grpc server Program Flags: -i, --interactive Run application with interactive mode -s, --static Run application with static mode -r, --firewall-rules <path> Path to the JSON file with 5-tuple rules when running with static mode

    Note:

    For additional information on the app use -h:

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    /opt/mellanox/doca/applications/firewall/bin/doca_firewall -h


  4. Running the application on the host:
    • For instructions on running the DOCA Flow gRPC server on the BlueField, refer to NVIDIA DOCA gRPC Infrastructure User Guide.
    • CLI example for running the app in interactive mode:
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      /opt/mellanox/doca/applications/firewall/bin/doca_firewall --grpc-address 192.168.101.2 -l 3 -i

    • CLI example for running the app in static mode:
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      /opt/mellanox/doca/applications/firewall/bin/doca_firewall --grpc-address 192.168.101.2 -l 3 -s -d firewall_rules.json

  5. To run doca_firewall using a JSON file:
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    doca_firewall --json [json_file]

    For example:
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    cd /opt/mellanox/doca/applications/firewall/bin ./doca_firewall --json firewall_params.json


Refer to NVIDIA DOCA Arg Parser User Guide for more information.

Flag Type Short Flag Long Flag/JSON Key Description JSON Content
General Flags l log-level Set the log level for the application:
  • CRITICAL=0
  • ERROR=1
  • WARNING=2
  • INFO=3
  • DEBUG=4
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"log-level": 4

v version Print program version information N/A
h help Print a help synopsis N/A
- grpc-address Set the IP address for the gRPC server
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"grpc-address": "0.0.0.0"

Program Flags i interactive Run with interactive mode
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"interactive": true

s static Run with static mode
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"static": false

r firewall-rules Path to JSON rules file
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"firewall-rules": "firewall_rules.json"

  • /opt/mellanox/doca/applications/firewall/src/firewall.c

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