NsJail is a process isolation tool designed to run applications inside tightly controlled environments.
It combines several Linux kernel security mechanisms rather than relying on a single isolation technique, making it suitable for executing potentially unsafe programs, hosting security challenges, fuzzing software or restricting desktop applications. A jail can be assembled directly from command-line options or described in a Protocol Buffers configuration file, allowing complex policies to be reused rather than reconstructed for every invocation.
This is free and open source software.
Key Features
- Supports standalone execution, direct execution, continuous process re-execution and inetd-style TCP listener modes.
- Can isolate UTS, mount, PID, IPC, network, user, cgroup and time namespaces.
- Supports chroot, pivot_root, read-only bind mounts, writable bind mounts and tmpfs mounts.
- Controls CPU time, address space, open file descriptors and process counts with resource limits.
- Integrates with cgroups for CPU, memory and process restrictions.
- Filters system calls with seccomp-bpf policies expressed using the Kafel policy language.
- Can move or clone network interfaces into a jail and supports MACVLAN networking.
- Offers user-mode networking through pasta.
- Supports custom UID and GID mappings inside user namespaces.
- Can selectively retain Linux capabilities rather than exposing the complete capability set.
- Provides example configurations for common application isolation scenarios.
- Supports reusable, structured configuration through Protocol Buffers as an alternative to lengthy command lines.
Website: github.com/google/nsjail
Support:
Developer: Google
License: Apache License 2.0
NsJail is written in C++. Learn C++ with our recommended free books and free tutorials.
Related Software
| Application Sandboxing Tools | |
|---|---|
| Firejail | Linux SUID sandbox for restricting application access |
| bubblewrap | Low-level tool for building unprivileged sandboxes |
| NsJail | Process isolation tool using namespaces, cgroups, and seccomp filters |
| Isolate | Secure execution environment for running untrusted programs with limits |
| Syd | Application sandbox providing configurable filesystem and syscall isolation |
| Hakoniwa | Process isolation tool built around Linux namespaces and security facilities |
Read our verdict in the software roundup.
 LinuxLinks helps you discover the best free and open source software for Linux. Explore our extensive collection of recommended applications, including alternatives to popular proprietary software.We also publish software reviews, Linux tutorials, hardware reviews, free programming books and articles covering the wider open source community. Browse our Linux resources to discover more. Know a useful free and open source Linux application we haven't covered? Suggest a program for inclusion. Has your software been featured on LinuxLinks? Display one of our Featured on LinuxLinks badges on your website or GitHub README. |
Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.