Playing in the Sandbox: A Study on the Usability of Seccomp

TL;DR

This study investigates the usability challenges faced by experienced developers when implementing Seccomp sandboxing, revealing diverse approaches and highlighting difficulties that hinder widespread adoption.

Contribution

It provides insights into developer practices and challenges in Seccomp sandboxing, offering guidance for improving usability and adoption.

Findings

Developers used varied approaches to sandboxing

Many usability challenges were identified

Design suggestions for easier sandboxing were proposed

Abstract

Sandboxing restricts what applications do, and prevents exploited processes being abused; yet relatively few applications get sandboxed: why? We report a usability trial with 7 experienced Seccomp developers exploring how they approached sandboxing an application and the difficulties they faced. The developers each approached sandboxing the application differently and each came to different solutions. We highlight many challenges of using Seccomp, the sandboxing designs by the participants, and what developers think would make it easier for them to sandbox applications effectively.