Building Falco - linux-on-ibm-z/docs GitHub Wiki

Building Falco

The instructions provided below specify the steps to build Falco version 0.41.3 on Linux on IBM Z for following distributions:

  • RHEL (8.10, 9.4, 9.6)
  • SLES 15 SP6
  • Ubuntu (22.04, 24.04, 25.04)

Falco supports all three kernel drivers starting with 0.34.x releases on s390x: Kernel module, eBPF probe and Modern eBPF probe. Please check driver - kernel version support matrix for detailed information.

General Notes:

  • When following the steps below please use standard permission user unless otherwise specified.
  • A directory /<source_root>/ will be referred to in these instructions, this is a temporary writable directory anywhere you'd like to place it.

1. Build using script

If you want to build Falco using manual steps, go to step 2.

Use the following commands to build Falco using the build script. Please make sure you have wget installed.

wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/linux-on-ibm-z/scripts/master/Falco/0.41.3/build_falco.sh

# Run bash build_falco.sh -h to see all available options
bash build_falco.sh

In case of error, check logs for more details or go to Step 2 to follow manual build steps.

2. Install dependencies

export SOURCE_ROOT=/<source_root>/

2.1. Install Basic Dependencies

  • RHEL 8.10

    sudo yum install -y gcc-toolset-13-gcc gcc-toolset-13-gcc-c++ git make cmake autoconf automake pkg-config patch libtool elfutils-libelf-devel diffutils which createrepo libarchive wget curl rpm-build kmod kernel-devel-$(uname -r) perl-IPC-Cmd perl-bignum perl-core clang llvm bpftool

source /opt/rh/gcc-toolset-13/enable

  • RHEL (9.4, 9.6)

    sudo yum install --allowerasing -y gcc gcc-c++ git make cmake autoconf automake pkg-config patch perl-IPC-Cmd perl-bignum perl-core perl-FindBin libtool elfutils-libelf-devel diffutils which createrepo libarchive wget curl rpm-build kmod kernel-devel-$(uname -r) clang llvm bpftool

  • SLES 15 SP6

    SLES_KERNEL_VERSION=$(uname -r | sed 's/-default//')
SLES_KERNEL_PKG_VERSION=$(sudo zypper se -s 'kernel-default-devel' | grep ${SLES_KERNEL_VERSION} | head -n 1 | cut -d "|" -f 4 - | tr -d '[:space:]')

sudo zypper install -y gcc gcc-c++ gcc13 gcc13-c++ git-core cmake patch which automake autoconf libtool libelf-devel gawk tar curl vim wget pkg-config glibc-devel-static "kernel-default-devel=${SLES_KERNEL_PKG_VERSION}" kmod clang17 llvm17 bpftool

sudo update-alternatives --install /usr/bin/g++ g++ /usr/bin/g++-13 50
export CC=$(which gcc)
export CXX=$(which g++)

  • Ubuntu 22.04

    sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install -y git cmake build-essential pkg-config autoconf wget curl patch libtool libelf-dev gcc rpm linux-headers-$(uname -r) linux-tools-$(uname -r) kmod clang llvm

  • Ubuntu (24.04, 25.04)

    sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install -y git cmake build-essential pkg-config autoconf wget curl patch libtool libelf-dev gcc gcc-12 g++-12 rpm linux-headers-$(uname -r) linux-tools-$(uname -r) kmod clang llvm

sudo update-alternatives --install /usr/bin/gcc gcc /usr/bin/gcc-12 100 --slave /usr/bin/g++ g++ /usr/bin/g++-12
export CC=$(which gcc)
export CXX=$(which g++)

2.2. Install Go

cd $SOURCE_ROOT
export GO_VERSION="1.25.0"
wget -q https://storage.googleapis.com/golang/go"$GO_VERSION".linux-s390x.tar.gz
chmod ugo+r go"$GO_VERSION".linux-s390x.tar.gz
sudo tar -C /usr/local -xzf go"$GO_VERSION".linux-s390x.tar.gz
sudo ln -sf /usr/local/go/bin/go /usr/bin/
sudo ln -sf /usr/local/go/bin/gofmt /usr/bin/
sudo ln -sf /usr/bin/gcc /usr/bin/s390x-linux-gnu-gcc # (Only on RHEL and SLES)
export GOPATH=$SOURCE_ROOT
export PATH=$GOPATH/bin:$PATH
export CC=$(which gcc)
export CXX=$(which g++)
go version

2.3. Install bpftool (Only for Ubuntu 22.04)

cd $SOURCE_ROOT
git clone --depth 1 --recurse-submodules https://github.com/libbpf/bpftool.git
cd bpftool && cd src
CLANG=Nope make -j8
sudo make install

2.4. Build container plugin

cd $SOURCE_ROOT
git clone --depth 1 -b plugins/container/v0.3.1 https://github.com/falcosecurity/plugins.git
cd plugins/plugins/container
make libcontainer.so
tar zcf $SOURCE_ROOT/container-0.3.1-linux-s390x.tar.gz libcontainer.so

3. Build and Install

3.1. Download source

cd $SOURCE_ROOT
git clone --depth 1 -b 0.41.3 https://github.com/falcosecurity/falco.git
cd falco

3.2. Apply patches

  • To include container plugin built for s390x

    wget -O $SOURCE_ROOT/falco/cmake/modules/falcosecurity-libs-repo/libs_container_plugin_cmake.patch $PATCH_URL/libs_container_plugin_cmake.patch

sed -i "s#SOURCE_ROOT_PATH#$SOURCE_ROOT#g" $SOURCE_ROOT/falco/cmake/modules/falcosecurity-libs-repo/libs_container_plugin_cmake.patch

curl -sSL $PATCH_URL/falco.patch | git apply -

  • To turn off modern BPF support (only for RHEL 8.X)

    curl -sSL $PATCH_URL/modern_bpf.patch | git apply -

3.3. Configure

  • Setup build directory

    mkdir -p $SOURCE_ROOT/falco/build
cd $SOURCE_ROOT/falco/build

  • Setup unit tests

    CMAKE_TEST_FLAG="-DBUILD_FALCO_UNIT_TESTS=ON"   # Only when unit tests are expected to be run after building Falco

CMAKE_TEST_FLAG=""  # Only when unit tests are not needed

  • RHEL 8.x only

    CMAKE_FLAGS="-DFALCO_ETC_DIR=/etc/falco -DUSE_BUNDLED_DEPS=ON -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release -DBUILD_DRIVER=ON -DBUILD_BPF=OFF ${CMAKE_TEST_FLAG}"

  • For all distros except RHEL 8.x

    CMAKE_FLAGS="-DFALCO_ETC_DIR=/etc/falco -DUSE_BUNDLED_DEPS=ON -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release -DBUILD_DRIVER=ON -DBUILD_BPF=ON -DBUILD_FALCO_MODERN_BPF=ON ${CMAKE_TEST_FLAG}"

  • Run CMake

    cmake $CMAKE_FLAGS ../

3.4. Build and Install

cd $SOURCE_ROOT/falco/build
sed -i 's/!found/found/g' falcosecurity-libs-repo/falcosecurity-libs-prefix/src/falcosecurity-libs/userspace/libscap/engine/modern_bpf/scap_modern_bpf.c # Only for Ubuntu
make -j$(nproc)
make package            # build deb/rpm packages (optional and only on Ubuntu and RHEL)
sudo make install

3.5. Load kernel module

  • Unload any existing module using

    sudo rmmod falco

  • Insert locally built version

    cd $SOURCE_ROOT/falco/build
sudo insmod driver/falco.ko

3.6. Copy eBPF driver object file to the default location (except RHEL 8.x)

sudo mkdir /root/.falco
sudo cp -f $SOURCE_ROOT/falco/build/driver/bpf/probe.o /root/.falco/falco-bpf.o

4. Testing (optional)

cd $SOURCE_ROOT/falco/build
sudo ./unit_tests/falco_unit_tests

A separate Falco project https://github.com/falcosecurity/event-generator can be used to run further tests.

5. Validate installation (optional)

Note: Run sudo falco --help to see available options to run Falco. By default, Falco logs events to standard error.

5.1. Run Falco with Kernel module

sudo falco -o engine.kind=kmod

Output similar to following will be seen

Thu Aug 14 06:32:05 2025: Falco version: 0.41.3 (s390x)
Thu Aug 14 06:32:05 2025: Falco initialized with configuration files:
Thu Aug 14 06:32:05 2025:    /etc/falco/config.d/falco.container_plugin.yaml | schema validation: ok
Thu Aug 14 06:32:05 2025:    /etc/falco/falco.yaml | schema validation: ok
Thu Aug 14 06:32:05 2025: System info: Linux version 6.8.0-71-generic (buildd@bos03-s390x-028) (s390x-linux-gnu-gcc-13 (Ubuntu 13.3.0-6ubuntu2~24.04) 13.3.0, GNU ld (GNU Binutils for Ubuntu) 2.42) #71-Ubuntu SMP Tue Jul 22 15:57:13 UTC 2025
Thu Aug 14 06:32:05 2025: Loading plugin 'container' from file /usr/share/falco/plugins/libcontainer.so
Thu Aug 14 06:32:05 2025: [libs]: container: Enabled 'podman' container engine.
Thu Aug 14 06:32:05 2025: [libs]: container: * enabled container runtime socket at '/run/podman/podman.sock'
Thu Aug 14 06:32:05 2025: [libs]: container: Enabled 'docker' container engine.
Thu Aug 14 06:32:05 2025: [libs]: container: * enabled container runtime socket at '/var/run/docker.sock'
Thu Aug 14 06:32:05 2025: [libs]: container: Enabled 'cri' container engine.
Thu Aug 14 06:32:05 2025: [libs]: container: * enabled container runtime socket at '/run/containerd/containerd.sock'
Thu Aug 14 06:32:05 2025: [libs]: container: * enabled container runtime socket at '/run/crio/crio.sock'
Thu Aug 14 06:32:05 2025: [libs]: container: * enabled container runtime socket at '/run/k3s/containerd/containerd.sock'
Thu Aug 14 06:32:05 2025: [libs]: container: * enabled container runtime socket at '/run/host-containerd/containerd.sock'
Thu Aug 14 06:32:05 2025: [libs]: container: Enabled 'containerd' container engine.
Thu Aug 14 06:32:05 2025: [libs]: container: * enabled container runtime socket at '/run/host-containerd/containerd.sock'
Thu Aug 14 06:32:05 2025: [libs]: container: Enabled 'lxc' container engine.
Thu Aug 14 06:32:05 2025: [libs]: container: Enabled 'libvirt_lxc' container engine.
Thu Aug 14 06:32:05 2025: [libs]: container: Enabled 'bpm' container engine.
Thu Aug 14 06:32:05 2025: Loading rules from:
Thu Aug 14 06:32:05 2025:    /etc/falco/falco_rules.yaml | schema validation: ok
Thu Aug 14 06:32:05 2025:    /etc/falco/falco_rules.local.yaml | schema validation: none
Thu Aug 14 06:32:05 2025: The chosen syscall buffer dimension is: 8388608 bytes (8 MBs)
Thu Aug 14 06:32:05 2025: Starting health webserver with threadiness 2, listening on 0.0.0.0:8765
Thu Aug 14 06:32:05 2025: Loaded event sources: syscall
Thu Aug 14 06:32:05 2025: Enabled event sources: syscall
Thu Aug 14 06:32:05 2025: Opening 'syscall' source with Kernel module
Thu Aug 14 06:32:05 2025: [libs]: Trying to open the right engine!

5.2. Run Falco with eBPF probe driver (except RHEL 8.x)

sudo falco -o engine.kind=ebpf

Output similar to following will be seen

Thu Aug 14 06:35:56 2025: Falco version: 0.41.3 (s390x)
Thu Aug 14 06:35:56 2025: Falco initialized with configuration files:
Thu Aug 14 06:35:56 2025:    /etc/falco/config.d/falco.container_plugin.yaml | schema validation: ok
Thu Aug 14 06:35:56 2025:    /etc/falco/falco.yaml | schema validation: ok
Thu Aug 14 06:35:56 2025: System info: Linux version 6.8.0-71-generic (buildd@bos03-s390x-028) (s390x-linux-gnu-gcc-13 (Ubuntu 13.3.0-6ubuntu2~24.04) 13.3.0, GNU ld (GNU Binutils for Ubuntu) 2.42) #71-Ubuntu SMP Tue Jul 22 15:57:13 UTC 2025
Thu Aug 14 06:35:56 2025: Loading plugin 'container' from file /usr/share/falco/plugins/libcontainer.so
Thu Aug 14 06:35:56 2025: [libs]: container: Enabled 'podman' container engine.
Thu Aug 14 06:35:56 2025: [libs]: container: * enabled container runtime socket at '/run/podman/podman.sock'
Thu Aug 14 06:35:56 2025: [libs]: container: Enabled 'docker' container engine.
Thu Aug 14 06:35:56 2025: [libs]: container: * enabled container runtime socket at '/var/run/docker.sock'
Thu Aug 14 06:35:56 2025: [libs]: container: Enabled 'cri' container engine.
Thu Aug 14 06:35:56 2025: [libs]: container: * enabled container runtime socket at '/run/containerd/containerd.sock'
Thu Aug 14 06:35:56 2025: [libs]: container: * enabled container runtime socket at '/run/crio/crio.sock'
Thu Aug 14 06:35:56 2025: [libs]: container: * enabled container runtime socket at '/run/k3s/containerd/containerd.sock'
Thu Aug 14 06:35:56 2025: [libs]: container: * enabled container runtime socket at '/run/host-containerd/containerd.sock'
Thu Aug 14 06:35:56 2025: [libs]: container: Enabled 'containerd' container engine.
Thu Aug 14 06:35:56 2025: [libs]: container: * enabled container runtime socket at '/run/host-containerd/containerd.sock'
Thu Aug 14 06:35:56 2025: [libs]: container: Enabled 'lxc' container engine.
Thu Aug 14 06:35:56 2025: [libs]: container: Enabled 'libvirt_lxc' container engine.
Thu Aug 14 06:35:56 2025: [libs]: container: Enabled 'bpm' container engine.
Thu Aug 14 06:35:56 2025: Loading rules from:
Thu Aug 14 06:35:56 2025:    /etc/falco/falco_rules.yaml | schema validation: ok
Thu Aug 14 06:35:56 2025:    /etc/falco/falco_rules.local.yaml | schema validation: none
Thu Aug 14 06:35:56 2025: The chosen syscall buffer dimension is: 8388608 bytes (8 MBs)
Thu Aug 14 06:35:56 2025: Starting health webserver with threadiness 2, listening on 0.0.0.0:8765
Thu Aug 14 06:35:56 2025: Loaded event sources: syscall
Thu Aug 14 06:35:56 2025: Enabled event sources: syscall
Thu Aug 14 06:35:56 2025: Opening 'syscall' source with BPF probe. BPF probe path: /root/.falco/falco-bpf.o
Thu Aug 14 06:35:56 2025: [libs]: Trying to open the right engine!

5.3. Run Falco with modern eBPF probe driver (default) (except RHEL 8.x)

sudo falco

Output similar to following will be seen

Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025: Falco version: 0.41.3 (s390x)
Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025: Falco initialized with configuration files:
Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025:    /etc/falco/config.d/falco.container_plugin.yaml | schema validation: ok
Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025:    /etc/falco/falco.yaml | schema validation: ok
Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025: System info: Linux version 6.8.0-71-generic (buildd@bos03-s390x-028) (s390x-linux-gnu-gcc-13 (Ubuntu 13.3.0-6ubuntu2~24.04) 13.3.0, GNU ld (GNU Binutils for Ubuntu) 2.42) #71-Ubuntu SMP Tue Jul 22 15:57:13 UTC 2025
Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025: Loading plugin 'container' from file /usr/share/falco/plugins/libcontainer.so
Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025: [libs]: container: Enabled 'podman' container engine.
Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025: [libs]: container: * enabled container runtime socket at '/run/podman/podman.sock'
Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025: [libs]: container: Enabled 'docker' container engine.
Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025: [libs]: container: * enabled container runtime socket at '/var/run/docker.sock'
Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025: [libs]: container: Enabled 'cri' container engine.
Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025: [libs]: container: * enabled container runtime socket at '/run/containerd/containerd.sock'
Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025: [libs]: container: * enabled container runtime socket at '/run/crio/crio.sock'
Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025: [libs]: container: * enabled container runtime socket at '/run/k3s/containerd/containerd.sock'
Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025: [libs]: container: * enabled container runtime socket at '/run/host-containerd/containerd.sock'
Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025: [libs]: container: Enabled 'containerd' container engine.
Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025: [libs]: container: * enabled container runtime socket at '/run/host-containerd/containerd.sock'
Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025: [libs]: container: Enabled 'lxc' container engine.
Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025: [libs]: container: Enabled 'libvirt_lxc' container engine.
Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025: [libs]: container: Enabled 'bpm' container engine.
Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025: Loading rules from:
Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025:    /etc/falco/falco_rules.yaml | schema validation: ok
Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025:    /etc/falco/falco_rules.local.yaml | schema validation: none
Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025: The chosen syscall buffer dimension is: 8388608 bytes (8 MBs)
Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025: Starting health webserver with threadiness 2, listening on 0.0.0.0:8765
Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025: Loaded event sources: syscall
Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025: Enabled event sources: syscall
Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025: Opening 'syscall' source with modern BPF probe.
Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025: One ring buffer every '2' CPUs.
Thu Aug 14 06:15:47 2025: [libs]: Trying to open the right engine!

Reference: