18–20 Sept 2024
Europe/Vienna timezone

OF != UEFI

18 Sept 2024, 12:20
20m
"Hall N2" (Austria Center)

"Hall N2"

Austria Center

161
System Boot and Security MC System Boot and Security MC

Speakers

Mr George Wilson (Security Architect) Nayna Jain

Description

Given the present discussions around UKI and nmbl, Linux appears to be headed towards a future where it most commonly boots directly rather than via a separate bootloader. The IBM Linux on Power team agrees that this is a laudable direction: work need not be duplicated between the kernel and bootloaders and the entire class of bootloader-specific bugs - including vulnerabilities - would become simply Linux bugs. Currently, community efforts appears to be focused on UEFI-based platforms but other platforms like OF are omitted. Security is an important factor to consider across platforms because it will be affected by changes in the boot sequence. This brief talk outlines some points for consideration when directly booting Linux on OF-based Power systems and calls for the inclusion of non-UEFI platforms in next generation boot designs.

Primary author

Mr George Wilson (Security Architect)

Co-author

Presentation materials