Device Protection in Docker Containers

Package installs inside a Docker container run in their own Linux environment, outside the reach of the agent on the host. With Protect Containers turned on, Device Protection on the host finds the running containers and installs the Linux agent into them, so npm, pip, and other package managers in the container get inspected the same way they do on the host.

Prerequisites

• Device Protection on a macOS, Windows, or Linux host, signed in to by a user whose docker command can reach the Docker engine. Docker Desktop is the tested setup. Other runtimes, such as Podman or Rancher Desktop, are covered only when they provide a working docker command.
• Containers based on a Debian-family image (Debian, Ubuntu) or a Red Hat-family image (RHEL, CentOS, Fedora, Rocky Linux, AlmaLinux). Alpine and other distributions are skipped.
• Outbound HTTPS from each container to github.com to download the installer.

Turn on container protection

1. Go to Device Protection → Settings.
2. Under Device Settings, turn on Protect Containers.

The setting applies to every device in your workspace. Devices pick it up on their next check-in.

How it works

The host agent checks the running containers every 30 seconds and installs into new containers as soon as they start. It only does this while protection is on, not paused, and the host is enrolled with a valid token.

• Only running containers are touched. Aikido never starts a stopped container.
• The Linux agent is installed when it is missing. Aikido runs the standard Linux install script as root inside the container with --container, using the host's token, then starts the agent. If the image has neither curl nor wget, Aikido installs curl with the image's package manager first. A container that already has the agent is only started.
• 2 containers at a time. An install can take a few minutes, so containers that start meanwhile wait their turn.
• Each container is its own device. A protected container reports to Aikido as a separate Linux device, linked to the host that protected it. When the container stops, the host unlinks it.
• The agent lives in the container, not the image. Removing the container removes the agent. A new container from the same image gets a fresh install when it starts.

These containers are skipped:

Turning Protect Containers off, or pausing protection on the host, stops new installs. It doesn't remove the agent from containers that already have it.

Opt a container out

Add the opt-out label when you start the container:

docker run --label com.aikido.endpoint.protection=disabled <image>

In Docker Compose, set it under labels on the service. To opt out every container from an image, add LABEL com.aikido.endpoint.protection=disabled to its Dockerfile.

Use the agent in a container

The agent routes package downloads through a proxy inside the container. Processes that were already running when the agent started don't use it. Commands you run afterwards need the agent's proxy and certificate settings, which it writes to /etc/profile.d/. Source them before you install packages:

docker exec -it <container> sh -c 'for f in /etc/profile.d/aikido-*.sh; do . "$f"; done; exec bash'

To protect containers from the moment they start, including the command they run on startup, build Device Protection into the image instead. See Device Protection in Containers.

Verify it works

From the host, run:

docker exec -u 0 <container> aikidoctl version

It prints the installed version and the agent's state. If the command is not found, the install hasn't happened yet: check that the container is running and isn't on the skipped list above.

Troubleshooting

The host agent log is at:

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