OpenShift Confidential Computing with Kata Containers

This guide demonstrates how to run confidential workloads on OpenShift using Kata Containers. Workloads scheduled with the kata-cc RuntimeClass leverage AMD SEV, SEV-ES, and SEV-SNP hardware-backed memory encryption.

Test Pod Manifest

Below is a pod manifest that demonstrates confidential computing with SEV-SNP enabled.

apiVersion: v1
kind: Pod
metadata:
  name: kata-cc-demo
spec:
  runtimeClassName: kata-cc
  containers:
    - name: demo
      image: registry.access.redhat.com/ubi9/ubi-minimal:latest
      command: ["/bin/sh", "-c"]
      args:
        - |
          microdnf install -y procps-ng util-linux
          echo "Verifying confidential computing (SEV-SNP) status..."
          dmesg | grep -i SEV
          echo "Pod will remain running for inspection"
          sleep 3600
      securityContext:
        privileged: true
  restartPolicy: Never

# Expected Output from inside the pod:
# ------------------------------------
# Memory Encryption Features active: AMD SEV SEV-ES SEV-SNP
# SEV: Status: SEV SEV-ES SEV-SNP
# SEV: APIC: wakeup_secondary_cpu() replaced with wakeup_cpu_via_vmgexit()
# SEV: Using SNP CPUID table, 29 entries present.
# SEV: SNP running at VMPL0
# SEV: SNP guest platform device initialized
# sev-guest sev-guest: Initialized SEV guest driver (using vmpck_id 0)