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Limiting information leakage and piracy due to virtual machine cloning

A virtual machine instance, virtual machine technology, applied in the information field, which can solve problems such as information leakage, privacy and/or confidentiality leakage

Active Publication Date: 2014-05-21
IBM CORP
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  • Summary
  • Abstract
  • Description
  • Claims
  • Application Information

AI Technical Summary

Problems solved by technology

Customers or users usually aim to prevent any unauthorized VM cloning of their VMs as such cloning can lead to information disclosure or even privacy and / or confidentiality leakage

Method used

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  • Limiting information leakage and piracy due to virtual machine cloning
  • Limiting information leakage and piracy due to virtual machine cloning
  • Limiting information leakage and piracy due to virtual machine cloning

Examples

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Embodiment Construction

[0009] As described herein, one aspect of the invention includes preventing information disclosure and theft due to virtual machine (VM) cloning, and preventing unauthorized re-instantiation of VMs. At least one embodiment of the invention includes using a hard-to-detect malware-type agent to detect whether a VM is a genuine VM or a copy or clone, and deactivating an instance of the cloned VM by the malware-type agent upon detection.

[0010] At least one embodiment of the invention can be practiced in a context such as the following example scenario. Customers or third parties run servers that track unique VMs. A VM running in the cloud runs an agent (on the VM) that reports a unique identifier to the server periodically or randomly. Therefore, to evade detection by individual users or entities wishing to clone a VM without the customer's permission, one aspect of the present invention includes running the agent in a malware-like manner (e.g., attaching to a dynamic link lib...

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PUM

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Abstract

Techniques for detecting a cloned virtual machine instance. A method includes transmitting an identifier associated a virtual machine from an agent embedded in the virtual machine akin to a malware to a detection entity in a network, determining whether the identifier is a unique identifier or whether the identifier is a clone of an identifier associated with a separate virtual machine in the network, and initiating at least one remedial action with the agent embedded in the virtual machine if the identifier is determined to be a clone of an identifier associated with a separate virtual machine in the network.

Description

technical field [0001] Embodiments of the invention relate generally to information technology and, more specifically, to virtual machine (VM) management. Background technique [0002] Virtual machines (VMs) running in the cloud can be cloned or copied. For example, a system administrator may perform cloning, a guest or user of a VM may inadvertently perform cloning, or an attacker may perform cloning maliciously. Customers or users generally aim to prevent any unauthorized VM cloning of their VMs, as such cloning can lead to information disclosure and even privacy and / or confidentiality leakage. Therefore, there is a need to limit information disclosure caused by unauthorized VM cloning. Contents of the invention [0003] In one aspect of the invention, techniques are provided for limiting information disclosure and theft due to virtual machine cloning. An exemplary computer-implemented method for detecting a cloned virtual machine instance may include the step of: tra...

Claims

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Application Information

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IPC IPC(8): G06F21/56
CPCG06F21/56G06F2221/034G06F21/554G06F21/566
Inventor S·A·巴赛特A·康杜S·萨胡
Owner IBM CORP