NAME

       keyutils - in-kernel key management utilities

DESCRIPTION

       The keyutils package is a library and a set of utilities for accessing the kernel keyrings facility.

       A header file is supplied to provide the definitions and declarations required to access the library:

              #include <keyutils.h>

       To link with the library, the following:

              -lkeyutils

       should be specified to the linker.

       Three system calls are provided:

       add_key(2)
              Supply a new key to the kernel.

       request_key(2)
              Find an existing key for use, or, optionally, create one if one does not exist.

       keyctl(2)
              Control a key in various ways.  The library provides a variety of wrappers around this system call
              and those should be used rather than calling it directly.

       See the add_key(2), request_key(2), and keyctl(2) manual pages for more information.

       The keyctl() wrappers are listed on the keyctl(3) manual page.

UTILITIES

       A program is provided to interact with the kernel facility by a number of subcommands, e.g.:

              keyctl add user foo bar @s

       See the keyctl(1) manual page for information on that.

       The kernel has the ability to upcall to userspace to fabricate  new  keys.   This  can  be  triggered  by
       request_key(), but userspace is better off using add_key() instead if it possibly can.

       The  upcalling  mechanism  is  usually  routed  via  the request-key(8) program.  What this does with any
       particular key is configurable in:

              /etc/request-key.conf
              /etc/request-key.d/

       See the request-key.conf(5) and the request-key(8) manual pages for more information.

SEE ALSO

       keyctl(1), keyctl(3), keyrings(7), persistent-keyring(7), process-keyring(7), session-keyring(7),
       thread-keyring(7), user-keyring(7), user-session-keyring(7), pam_keyinit(8)