I-JVM: a Java Virtual Machine for Component Isolation in OSGi

Nicolas Geoffray (1) , Gaël Thomas (1) , Gilles Muller (1) , Pierre Parrend (2) , Stéphane Frénot (2) , Bertil Folliot (1)

1 Regal - Large-Scale Distributed Systems and Applications
2 AMAZONES - Ambient Middleware Architectures: Service-Oriented, Networked, Efficient and Secured

The OSGi framework is a Java-based, centralized, component oriented platform. It is being widely adopted as an execution environment for the development of extensible applications. However, current Java Virtual Machines are unable to isolate components from each other. For instance, a malicious component can freeze the complete platform by allocating too much memory or alter the behavior of other components by modifying shared variables. This paper presents I-JVM, a Java Virtual Machine that provides a lightweight approach to isolation while preserving compatibility with legacy OSGi applications. Our evaluation of I-JVM shows that it solves the 8 known OSGi vulnerabilities that are due to the Java Virtual Machine. Overall, the overhead of I-JVM compared to the JVM on which it is based is below 20%.

Mots clés: Java; Isolation; Thread Migration; Resource Accounting; OSGi

Domaines: Système d'exploitation [cs.OS]

Nicolas Geoffray, Gaël Thomas, Gilles Muller, Pierre Parrend, Stéphane Frénot, et al.. I-JVM: a Java Virtual Machine for Component Isolation in OSGi. [Research Report] RR-6801, INRIA. 2009, pp.21. ⟨inria-00354580⟩