# Kubernetes Basics

## Kubernetes Basics

{{#include ../../banners/hacktricks-training.md}}

**The original author of this page is** [**Jorge**](https://www.linkedin.com/in/jorge-belmonte-a924b616b/) **(read his original post** [**here**](https://sickrov.github.io)**)**

## Architecture & Basics

### What does Kubernetes do?

- Allows running container/s in a container engine.
- Schedule allows containers mission efficient.
- Keep containers alive.
- Allows container communications.
- Allows deployment techniques.
- Handle volumes of information.

### Architecture

![](https://sickrov.github.io/media/Screenshot-68.jpg)

- **Node**: operating system with pod or pods.
  - **Pod**: Wrapper around a container or multiple containers with. A pod should only contain one application (so usually, a pod run just 1 container). The pod is the way kubernetes abstracts the container technology running.
    - **Service**: Each pod has 1 internal **IP address** from the internal range of the node. However, it can be also exposed via a service. The **service has also an IP address** and its goal is to maintain the communication between pods so if one dies the **new replacement** (with a different internal IP) **will be accessible** exposed in the **same IP of the service**. It can be configured as internal or external. The service also actuates as a **load balancer when 2 pods are connected** to the same service.\
      When a **service** is **created** you can find the endpoints of each service running `kubectl get endpoints`
- **Kubelet**: Primary node agent. The component that establishes communication between node and kubectl, and only can run pods (through API server). The kubelet doesn’t manage containers that were not created by Kubernetes.
- **Kube-proxy**: is the service in charge of the communications (services) between the apiserver and the node. The base is an IPtables for nodes. Most experienced users could install other kube-proxies from other vendors.
- **Sidecar container**: Sidecar containers are the containers that should run along with the main container in the pod. This sidecar pattern extends and enhances the functionality of current containers without changing them. Nowadays, We know that we use container technology to wrap all the dependencies for the application to run anywhere. A container does only one thing and does that thing very well.
- **Master process:**
  - **Api Server:** Is the way the users and the pods use to communicate with the master process. Only authenticated request should be allowed.
  - **Scheduler**: Scheduling refers to making sure that Pods are matched to Nodes so that Kubelet can run them. It has enough intelligence to decide which node has more available resources the assign the new pod to it. Note that the scheduler doesn't start new pods, it just communicate with the Kubelet process running inside the node, which will launch the new pod.
  - **Kube Controller manager**: It checks resources like replica sets or deployments to check if, for example, the correct number of pods or nodes are running. In case a pod is missing, it will communicate with the scheduler to start a new one. It controls replication, tokens, and account services to the API.
  - **etcd**: Data storage, persistent, consistent, and distributed. Is Kubernetes’s database and the key-value storage where it keeps the complete state of the clusters (each change is logged here). Components like the Scheduler or the Controller manager depends on this date to know which changes have occurred (available resourced of the nodes, number of pods running...)
- **Cloud controller manager**: Is the specific controller for flow controls and applications, i.e: if you have clusters in AWS or OpenStack.

Note that as the might be several nodes (running several pods), there might also be several master processes which their access to the Api server load balanced and their etcd synchronized.

**Volumes:**

When a pod creates data that shouldn't be lost when the pod disappear it should be stored in a physical volume. **Kubernetes allow to attach a volume to a pod to persist the data**. The volume can be in the local machine or in a **remote storage**. If you are running pods in different physical nodes you should use a remote storage so all the pods can access it.

**Other configurations:**

- **ConfigMap**: You can configure **URLs** to access services. The pod will obtain data from here to know how to communicate with the rest of the services (pods). Note that this is not the recommended place to save credentials!
- **Secret**: This is the place to **store secret data** like passwords, API keys... encoded in B64. The pod will be able to access this data to use the required credentials.
- **Deployments**: This is where the components to be run by kubernetes are indicated. A user usually won't work directly with pods, pods are abstracted in **ReplicaSets** (number of same pods replicated), which are run via deployments. Note that deployments are for **stateless** applications. The minimum configuration for a deployment is the name and the image to run.
- **StatefulSet**: This component is meant specifically for applications like **databases** which needs to **access the same storage**.
- **Ingress**: This is the configuration that is use to **expose the application publicly with an URL**. Note that this can also be done using external services, but this is the correct way to expose the application.
  - If you implement an Ingress you will need to create **Ingress Controllers**. The Ingress Controller is a **pod** that will be the endpoint that will receive the requests and check and will load balance them to the services. the ingress controller will **send the request based on the ingress rules configured**. Note that the ingress rules can point to different paths or even subdomains to different internal kubernetes services.
    - A better security practice would be to use a cloud load balancer or a proxy server as entrypoint to don't have any part of the Kubernetes cluster exposed.
    - When request that doesn't match any ingress rule is received, the ingress controller will direct it to the "**Default backend**". You can `describe` the ingress controller to get the address of this parameter.
    - `minikube addons enable ingress`

### PKI infrastructure - Certificate Authority CA:

![](https://sickrov.github.io/media/Screenshot-66.jpg)

- CA is the trusted root for all certificates inside the cluster.
- Allows components to validate to each other.
- All cluster certificates are signed by the CA.
- ETCd has its own certificate.
- types:
  - apiserver cert.
  - kubelet cert.
  - scheduler cert.

## Basic Actions

### Minikube

**Minikube** can be used to perform some **quick tests** on kubernetes without needing to deploy a whole kubernetes environment. It will run the **master and node processes in one machine**. Minikube will use virtualbox to run the node. See [**here how to install it**](https://minikube.sigs.k8s.io/docs/start/).

```
$ minikube start
😄  minikube v1.19.0 on Ubuntu 20.04
✨  Automatically selected the virtualbox driver. Other choices: none, ssh
💿  Downloading VM boot image ...
    > minikube-v1.19.0.iso.sha256: 65 B / 65 B [-------------] 100.00% ? p/s 0s
    > minikube-v1.19.0.iso: 244.49 MiB / 244.49 MiB  100.00% 1.78 MiB p/s 2m17.
👍  Starting control plane node minikube in cluster minikube
💾  Downloading Kubernetes v1.20.2 preload ...
    > preloaded-images-k8s-v10-v1...: 491.71 MiB / 491.71 MiB  100.00% 2.59 MiB
🔥  Creating virtualbox VM (CPUs=2, Memory=3900MB, Disk=20000MB) ...
🐳  Preparing Kubernetes v1.20.2 on Docker 20.10.4 ...
    ▪ Generating certificates and keys ...
    ▪ Booting up control plane ...
    ▪ Configuring RBAC rules ...
🔎  Verifying Kubernetes components...
    ▪ Using image gcr.io/k8s-minikube/storage-provisioner:v5
🌟  Enabled addons: storage-provisioner, default-storageclass
🏄  Done! kubectl is now configured to use "minikube" cluster and "default" namespace by defaul

$ minikube status
host: Running
kubelet: Running
apiserver: Running
kubeconfig: Configured

---- ONCE YOU HAVE A K8 SERVICE RUNNING WITH AN EXTERNAL SERVICE -----
$ minikube service mongo-express-service
(This will open your browser to access the service exposed port)

$ minikube delete
🔥  Deleting "minikube" in virtualbox ...
💀  Removed all traces of the "minikube" cluster
```

### Kubectl Basics

**`Kubectl`** is the command line tool for kubernetes clusters. It communicates with the Api server of the master process to perform actions in kubernetes or to ask for data.

```bash
kubectl version #Get client and server version
kubectl get pod
kubectl get services
kubectl get deployment
kubectl get replicaset
kubectl get secret
kubectl get all
kubectl get ingress
kubectl get endpoints

#kubectl create deployment <deployment-name> --image=<docker image>
kubectl create deployment nginx-deployment --image=nginx
#Access the configuration of the deployment and modify it
#kubectl edit deployment <deployment-name>
kubectl edit deployment nginx-deployment
#Get the logs of the pod for debbugging (the output of the docker container running)
#kubectl logs <replicaset-id/pod-id>
kubectl logs nginx-deployment-84cd76b964
#kubectl describe pod <pod-id>
kubectl describe pod mongo-depl-5fd6b7d4b4-kkt9q
#kubectl exec -it <pod-id> -- bash
kubectl exec -it mongo-depl-5fd6b7d4b4-kkt9q -- bash
#kubectl describe service <service-name>
kubectl describe service mongodb-service
#kubectl delete deployment <deployment-name>
kubectl delete deployment mongo-depl
#Deploy from config file
kubectl apply -f deployment.yml
```

### Minikube Dashboard

The dashboard allows you to see easier what is minikube running, you can find the URL to access it in:

```
minikube dashboard --url


🔌  Enabling dashboard ...
    ▪ Using image kubernetesui/dashboard:v2.3.1
    ▪ Using image kubernetesui/metrics-scraper:v1.0.7
🤔  Verifying dashboard health ...
🚀  Launching proxy ...
🤔  Verifying proxy health ...
http://127.0.0.1:50034/api/v1/namespaces/kubernetes-dashboard/services/http:kubernetes-dashboard:/proxy/
```

### YAML configuration files examples

Each configuration file has 3 parts: **metadata**, **specification** (what need to be launch), **status** (desired state).\
Inside the specification of the deployment configuration file you can find the template defined with a new configuration structure defining the image to run:

**Example of Deployment + Service declared in the same configuration file (from** [**here**](https://gitlab.com/nanuchi/youtube-tutorial-series/-/blob/master/demo-kubernetes-components/mongo.yaml)**)**

As a service usually is related to one deployment it's possible to declare both in the same configuration file (the service declared in this config is only accessible internally):

```yaml
apiVersion: apps/v1
kind: Deployment
metadata:
  name: mongodb-deployment
  labels:
    app: mongodb
spec:
  replicas: 1
  selector:
    matchLabels:
      app: mongodb
  template:
    metadata:
      labels:
        app: mongodb
    spec:
      containers:
        - name: mongodb
          image: mongo
          ports:
            - containerPort: 27017
          env:
            - name: MONGO_INITDB_ROOT_USERNAME
              valueFrom:
                secretKeyRef:
                  name: mongodb-secret
                  key: mongo-root-username
            - name: MONGO_INITDB_ROOT_PASSWORD
              valueFrom:
                secretKeyRef:
                  name: mongodb-secret
                  key: mongo-root-password
---
apiVersion: v1
kind: Service
metadata:
  name: mongodb-service
spec:
  selector:
    app: mongodb
  ports:
    - protocol: TCP
      port: 27017
      targetPort: 27017
```

**Example of external service config**

This service will be accessible externally (check the `nodePort` and `type: LoadBlancer` attributes):

```yaml
---
apiVersion: v1
kind: Service
metadata:
  name: mongo-express-service
spec:
  selector:
    app: mongo-express
  type: LoadBalancer
  ports:
    - protocol: TCP
      port: 8081
      targetPort: 8081
      nodePort: 30000
```

> [!NOTE]
> This is useful for testing but for production you should have only internal services and an Ingress to expose the application.

**Example of Ingress config file**

This will expose the application in `http://dashboard.com`.

```yaml
apiVersion: networking.k8s.io/v1
kind: Ingress
metadata:
  name: dashboard-ingress
  namespace: kubernetes-dashboard
spec:
  rules:
    - host: dashboard.com
      http:
        paths:
          - backend:
              serviceName: kubernetes-dashboard
              servicePort: 80
```

**Example of secrets config file**

Note how the password are encoded in B64 (which isn't secure!)

```yaml
apiVersion: v1
kind: Secret
metadata:
  name: mongodb-secret
type: Opaque
data:
  mongo-root-username: dXNlcm5hbWU=
  mongo-root-password: cGFzc3dvcmQ=
```

**Example of ConfigMap**

A **ConfigMap** is the configuration that is given to the pods so they know how to locate and access other services. In this case, each pod will know that the name `mongodb-service` is the address of a pod that they can communicate with (this pod will be executing a mongodb):

```yaml
apiVersion: v1
kind: ConfigMap
metadata:
  name: mongodb-configmap
data:
  database_url: mongodb-service
```

Then, inside a **deployment config** this address can be specified in the following way so it's loaded inside the env of the pod:

```yaml
[...]
spec:
  [...]
  template:
    [...]
    spec:
      containers:
      - name: mongo-express
        image: mongo-express
        ports:
        - containerPort: 8081
        env:
        - name: ME_CONFIG_MONGODB_SERVER
          valueFrom:
            configMapKeyRef:
              name: mongodb-configmap
              key: database_url
[...]
```

**Example of volume config**

You can find different example of storage configuration yaml files in [https://gitlab.com/nanuchi/youtube-tutorial-series/-/tree/master/kubernetes-volumes](https://gitlab.com/nanuchi/youtube-tutorial-series/-/tree/master/kubernetes-volumes).\
**Note that volumes aren't inside namespaces**

### Namespaces

Kubernetes supports **multiple virtual clusters** backed by the same physical cluster. These virtual clusters are called **namespaces**. These are intended for use in environments with many users spread across multiple teams, or projects. For clusters with a few to tens of users, you should not need to create or think about namespaces at all. You only should start using namespaces to have a better control and organization of each part of the application deployed in kubernetes.

Namespaces provide a scope for names. Names of resources need to be unique within a namespace, but not across namespaces. Namespaces cannot be nested inside one another and **each** Kubernetes **resource** can only be **in** **one** **namespace**.

There are 4 namespaces by default if you are using minikube:

```
kubectl get namespace
NAME              STATUS   AGE
default           Active   1d
kube-node-lease   Active   1d
kube-public       Active   1d
kube-system       Active   1d
```

- **kube-system**: It's not meant or the users use and you shouldn't touch it. It's for master and kubectl processes.
- **kube-public**: Publicly accessible date. Contains a configmap which contains cluster information
- **kube-node-lease**: Determines the availability of a node
- **default**: The namespace the user will use to create resources

```bash
#Create namespace
kubectl create namespace my-namespace
```

> [!NOTE]
> Note that most Kubernetes resources (e.g. pods, services, replication controllers, and others) are in some namespaces. However, other resources like namespace resources and low-level resources, such as nodes and persistenVolumes are not in a namespace. To see which Kubernetes resources are and aren’t in a namespace:
>
> ```bash
> kubectl api-resources --namespaced=true #In a namespace
> kubectl api-resources --namespaced=false #Not in a namespace
> ```

You can save the namespace for all subsequent kubectl commands in that context.

```bash
kubectl config set-context --current --namespace=<insert-namespace-name-here>
```

### Helm

Helm is the **package manager** for Kubernetes. It allows to package YAML files and distribute them in public and private repositories. These packages are called **Helm Charts**.

```
helm search <keyword>
```

Helm is also a template engine that allows to generate config files with variables:

## Kubernetes secrets

A **Secret** is an object that **contains sensitive data** such as a password, a token or a key. Such information might otherwise be put in a Pod specification or in an image. Users can create Secrets and the system also creates Secrets. The name of a Secret object must be a valid **DNS subdomain name**. Read here [the official documentation](https://kubernetes.io/docs/concepts/configuration/secret/).

Secrets might be things like:

- API, SSH Keys.
- OAuth tokens.
- Credentials, Passwords (plain text or b64 + encryption).
- Information or comments.
- Database connection code, strings… .

There are different types of secrets in Kubernetes

| Builtin Type                        | Usage                                     |
| ----------------------------------- | ----------------------------------------- |
| **Opaque**                          | **arbitrary user-defined data (Default)** |
| kubernetes.io/service-account-token | service account token                     |
| kubernetes.io/dockercfg             | serialized \~/.dockercfg file             |
| kubernetes.io/dockerconfigjson      | serialized \~/.docker/config.json file    |
| kubernetes.io/basic-auth            | credentials for basic authentication      |
| kubernetes.io/ssh-auth              | credentials for SSH authentication        |
| kubernetes.io/tls                   | data for a TLS client or server           |
| bootstrap.kubernetes.io/token       | bootstrap token data                      |

> [!NOTE]
> **The Opaque type is the default one, the typical key-value pair defined by users.**

**How secrets works:**

![](https://sickrov.github.io/media/Screenshot-164.jpg)

The following configuration file defines a **secret** called `mysecret` with 2 key-value pairs `username: YWRtaW4=` and `password: MWYyZDFlMmU2N2Rm`. It also defines a **pod** called `secretpod` that will have the `username` and `password` defined in `mysecret` exposed in the **environment variables** `SECRET_USERNAME` \_\_ and \_\_ `SECRET_PASSWOR`. It will also **mount** the `username` secret inside `mysecret` in the path `/etc/foo/my-group/my-username` with `0640` permissions.

```yaml:secretpod.yaml
apiVersion: v1
kind: Secret
metadata:
  name: mysecret
type: Opaque
data:
  username: YWRtaW4=
  password: MWYyZDFlMmU2N2Rm
---
apiVersion: v1
kind: Pod
metadata:
  name: secretpod
spec:
  containers:
    - name: secretpod
      image: nginx
      env:
        - name: SECRET_USERNAME
          valueFrom:
            secretKeyRef:
              name: mysecret
              key: username
        - name: SECRET_PASSWORD
          valueFrom:
            secretKeyRef:
              name: mysecret
              key: password
      volumeMounts:
        - name: foo
          mountPath: "/etc/foo"
  restartPolicy: Never
  volumes:
    - name: foo
      secret:
        secretName: mysecret
        items:
          - key: username
            path: my-group/my-username
            mode: 0640
```

```bash
kubectl apply -f <secretpod.yaml>
kubectl get pods #Wait until the pod secretpod is running
kubectl exec -it  secretpod -- bash
env | grep SECRET && cat /etc/foo/my-group/my-username && echo
```

### Secrets in etcd <a href="#discover-secrets-in-etcd" id="discover-secrets-in-etcd"></a>

**etcd** is a consistent and highly-available **key-value store** used as Kubernetes backing store for all cluster data. Let’s access to the secrets stored in etcd:

```bash
cat /etc/kubernetes/manifests/kube-apiserver.yaml | grep etcd
```

You will see certs, keys and url’s were are located in the FS. Once you get it, you would be able to connect to etcd.

```bash
#ETCDCTL_API=3 etcdctl --cert <path to client.crt> --key <path to client.ket> --cacert <path to CA.cert> endpoint=[<ip:port>] health

ETCDCTL_API=3 etcdctl --cert /etc/kubernetes/pki/apiserver-etcd-client.crt --key /etc/kubernetes/pki/apiserver-etcd-client.key --cacert /etc/kubernetes/pki/etcd/etcd/ca.cert endpoint=[127.0.0.1:1234] health
```

Once you achieve establish communication you would be able to get the secrets:

```bash
#ETCDCTL_API=3 etcdctl --cert <path to client.crt> --key <path to client.ket> --cacert <path to CA.cert> endpoint=[<ip:port>] get <path/to/secret>

ETCDCTL_API=3 etcdctl --cert /etc/kubernetes/pki/apiserver-etcd-client.crt --key /etc/kubernetes/pki/apiserver-etcd-client.key --cacert /etc/kubernetes/pki/etcd/etcd/ca.cert endpoint=[127.0.0.1:1234] get /registry/secrets/default/secret_02
```

**Adding encryption to the ETCD**

By default all the secrets are **stored in plain** text inside etcd unless you apply an encryption layer. The following example is based on [https://kubernetes.io/docs/tasks/administer-cluster/encrypt-data/](https://kubernetes.io/docs/tasks/administer-cluster/encrypt-data/)

```yaml:encryption.yaml
apiVersion: apiserver.config.k8s.io/v1
kind: EncryptionConfiguration
resources:
  - resources:
      - secrets
    providers:
      - aescbc:
          keys:
            - name: key1
              secret: cjjPMcWpTPKhAdieVtd+KhG4NN+N6e3NmBPMXJvbfrY= #Any random key
      - identity: {}
```

After that, you need to set the `--encryption-provider-config` flag on the `kube-apiserver` to point to the location of the created config file. You can modify `/etc/kubernetes/manifest/kube-apiserver.yaml` and add the following lines:

```yaml
containers:
  - command:
      - kube-apiserver
      - --encriyption-provider-config=/etc/kubernetes/etcd/<configFile.yaml>
```

Scroll down in the volumeMounts:

```yaml
- mountPath: /etc/kubernetes/etcd
    name: etcd
    readOnly: true
```

Scroll down in the volumeMounts to hostPath:

```yaml
- hostPath:
    path: /etc/kubernetes/etcd
    type: DirectoryOrCreate
  name: etcd
```

**Verifying that data is encrypted**

Data is encrypted when written to etcd. After restarting your `kube-apiserver`, any newly created or updated secret should be encrypted when stored. To check, you can use the `etcdctl` command line program to retrieve the contents of your secret.

1.  Create a new secret called `secret1` in the `default` namespace:

    ```
    kubectl create secret generic secret1 -n default --from-literal=mykey=mydata
    ```

2.  Using the etcdctl commandline, read that secret out of etcd:

    `ETCDCTL_API=3 etcdctl get /registry/secrets/default/secret1 [...] | hexdump -C`

    where `[...]` must be the additional arguments for connecting to the etcd server.

3.  Verify the stored secret is prefixed with `k8s:enc:aescbc:v1:` which indicates the `aescbc` provider has encrypted the resulting data.
4.  Verify the secret is correctly decrypted when retrieved via the API:

    ```
    kubectl describe secret secret1 -n default
    ```

    should match `mykey: bXlkYXRh`, mydata is encoded, check [decoding a secret](https://kubernetes.io/docs/concepts/configuration/secret#decoding-a-secret) to completely decode the secret.

**Since secrets are encrypted on write, performing an update on a secret will encrypt that content:**

```
kubectl get secrets --all-namespaces -o json | kubectl replace -f -
```

**Final tips:**

- Try not to keep secrets in the FS, get them from other places.
- Check out [https://www.vaultproject.io/](https://www.vaultproject.io) for add more protection to your secrets.
- [https://kubernetes.io/docs/concepts/configuration/secret/#risks](https://kubernetes.io/docs/concepts/configuration/secret/#risks)
- [https://docs.cyberark.com/Product-Doc/OnlineHelp/AAM-DAP/11.2/en/Content/Integrations/Kubernetes_deployApplicationsConjur-k8s-Secrets.htm](https://docs.cyberark.com/Product-Doc/OnlineHelp/AAM-DAP/11.2/en/Content/Integrations/Kubernetes_deployApplicationsConjur-k8s-Secrets.htm)

## References

{{#ref}}
https://sickrov.github.io/
{{#endref}}

{{#ref}}
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X48VuDVv0do
{{#endref}}

{{#include ../../banners/hacktricks-training.md}}



