Automated LUKS Unlocking

[Bastien Nocera]

On Tue, 2016-03-15 at 16:59 -0400, Nathaniel McCallum wrote:
> Sorry for the cross-post! However, I figured it was the best way to
> reach all the right people.
> 
> I'm the author of the Tang[1] project. In a nutshell, Tang provides a
> way to bind an encrypted disk to a network. We currently provide
> automated unlocking of the root volume (via initramfs/systemd).
> 
> However, one of our use cases is securing removable devices so that
> they can only be unlocked when the host computer is on a secure
> network. I have looked a bit at the code for GVFS and udisks, but it
> wasn't immediately obvious to me the best way to proceed in adding
> support for this. So I'm here looking for suggestions.
> 
> More or less, in order to automatically recover a disk's key we need
> read access to the LUKS header and network access to perform the Tang
> exchange. It would be my strong preference not to expose the metadata
> in the LUKS header to unpriviledge users.
> 
> I attempted to test this by provisioning a USB key using Tang. Upon
> insertion, GNOME (properly) prompts for the password. If I attempt to
> unlock the disk in the background during this operation, the password
> prompt is properly removed. However, the disk does not appear as a
> standard removable disk any more in Nautilus.
> 
> Thoughts? Suggestions?

Look at the output of "udisksctl dump". If your device shows up there,
and depending on the value of the various properties it exposes
(especially the hints), it might be a bug in gvfs' udisks-based volume
monitor.

Cheers