EKFuzz: Fuzzing the BPF subsystem

The extended Berkeley Packet Filter (eBPF) framework has revolutionized the way developers interact with the Linux kernel by enabling safe, dynamic programmability. However, this flexibility comes at a cost. The new kernel functions (kfuncs) exposed to eBPF programs are rapidly proliferating, often without adequate testing. While prior work has addressed verifier and helper function fuzzing, the kfuncs remain a largely unexplored attack surface. This thesis presents EKFuzz, a Syzkaller-based fuzzing extension that systematically targets kfuncs used by eBPF programs. EKFuzz incorporates type-aware generation of verifier-compliant programs, automatically generates dependent syscalls (e.g., for maps), and employs a mutation-driven feedback loop. Our evaluation demonstrates that EKFuzz achieves deeper runtime coverage than Syzkaller and uncovers latent bugs within the kfunc execution paths.

Publication Details

Journal
VTechWorks (Virginia Tech)
Published
2025-08-15
Primary Topic
Security and Verification in Computing
Type
article
Field-Weighted Citation Impact
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article

EKFuzz: Fuzzing the BPF subsystem

VTechWorks (Virginia Tech)
Security and Verification in Computing
article

EKFuzz: Fuzzing the BPF subsystem

article en

Abstract

The extended Berkeley Packet Filter (eBPF) framework has revolutionized the way developers interact with the Linux kernel by enabling safe, dynamic programmability. However, this flexibility comes at a cost. The new kernel functions (kfuncs) exposed to eBPF programs are rapidly proliferating, often without adequate testing. While prior work has addressed verifier and helper function fuzzing, the kfuncs remain a largely unexplored attack surface. This thesis presents EKFuzz, a Syzkaller-based fuzzing extension that systematically targets kfuncs used by eBPF programs. EKFuzz incorporates type-aware generation of verifier-compliant programs, automatically generates dependent syscalls (e.g., for maps), and employs a mutation-driven feedback loop. Our evaluation demonstrates that EKFuzz achieves deeper runtime coverage than Syzkaller and uncovers latent bugs within the kfunc execution paths.

VTechWorks (Virginia Tech)
Openalex Percentile: Top 20%
Security and Verification in Computing
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EKFuzz: Fuzzing the BPF subsystem · VTechWorks (Virginia Tech) (2025) | TGRS Research Map | TGRS