METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR SEQUENTIAL HYPERVISOR INVOCATION
First Claim
1. A system for protecting boot phases of a platform having virtualization technology capabilities, comprising:
- a processor coupled to a non-volatile firmware storage device;
a trusted software module for controlling an initial boot phase of the platform, the software module stored in the non-volatile firmware storage device, wherein the trusted software module is to be executed as a privileged component in a virtual machine to control boot operations;
system cache memory coupled to the processor, wherein a portion of the cache memory is to be configured as cache-as-RAM (CAR), and wherein the trusted software module is to be initially executed as resident in the CAR, prior to discovery and initialization of system random access memory (RAM), and once system RAM is initialized, the trusted software module is to be migrated to run in system RAM; and
a second software module to be launched by the trusted software module running in system RAM to control a next boot phase of the platform, wherein the second software module is to execute as a privileged component in a virtual machine.
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Abstract
In some embodiments, the invention involves a system and method for invoking a series of hypervisors on a platform. A hardware-based secure boot of a chained series of virtual machines throughout the life of the pre-operating system (OS) firmware/BIOS/loader/option ROM execution, with component-wise isolation of the pre-extensible firmware interface (PEI) and driver execution environment (DXE) cores is utilized. In an embodiment, a Cache-As-RAM (CAR) based hypervisor, executing directly from Flash memory manages sequential invocation of a next hypervisor. Other embodiments are described and claimed.
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Citations
19 Claims
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1. A system for protecting boot phases of a platform having virtualization technology capabilities, comprising:
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a processor coupled to a non-volatile firmware storage device; a trusted software module for controlling an initial boot phase of the platform, the software module stored in the non-volatile firmware storage device, wherein the trusted software module is to be executed as a privileged component in a virtual machine to control boot operations; system cache memory coupled to the processor, wherein a portion of the cache memory is to be configured as cache-as-RAM (CAR), and wherein the trusted software module is to be initially executed as resident in the CAR, prior to discovery and initialization of system random access memory (RAM), and once system RAM is initialized, the trusted software module is to be migrated to run in system RAM; and a second software module to be launched by the trusted software module running in system RAM to control a next boot phase of the platform, wherein the second software module is to execute as a privileged component in a virtual machine. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7)
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8. A method for protecting boot phases of a platform having virtualization technology capabilities, comprising:
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entering protected mode in the platform, responsive to a platform reset or power-on; enabling cache coupled to a boot processor in the platform to act as random access memory, referred to as cache-as-RAM (CAR); launching a first trusted software module, as a currently executing trusted software module, to execute in CAR, the first trusted software module retrieved from secure firmware storage coupled to the platform; initializing system random access memory (RAM); migrating the trusted software module to run in a privileged virtual machine in system RAM; and launching at least one successive trusted software module, as a new currently running trusted software module, in accordance with at least one launch control policy (LCP) accessible to the currently running trusted software module, wherein the at least one launch control policy determines whether the at least one successive trusted software module is valid, and if the successive trusted software module is not valid, then causing the platform boot to fail. - View Dependent Claims (9, 10, 11, 12, 13)
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14. A computer readable storage medium having instruction stored thereon for protecting boot phases of a platform having virtualization technology capabilities, the instructions when executed on the platform, cause the platform to:
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enter protected mode in the platform, responsive to a platform reset or power-on; enable cache coupled to a boot processor in the platform to act as random access memory, referred to as cache-as-RAM (CAR); launch a first trusted software module, as a currently executing trusted software module, to execute in CAR, the first trusted software module retrieved from secure firmware storage coupled to the platform; initialize system random access memory (RAM); migrate the trusted software module to run in a privileged virtual machine in system RAM; and launch at least one successive trusted software module, as a new currently running trusted software module, in accordance with at least one launch control policy (LCP) accessible to the currently running trusted software module, wherein the at least one launch control policy determines whether the at least one successive trusted software module is valid, and if the successive trusted software module is not valid, then causing the platform boot to fail. - View Dependent Claims (15, 16, 17, 18, 19)
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Specification