Cloudflare’s commitment to CISA Secure-By-Design pledge: delivering new kernels, faster
Apr 4, 2025Brandon Harris

Summary
This post details Cloudflare's commitment to the CISA Secure-by-Design pledge by focusing on the secure and timely patching of the Linux kernel. It outlines the rigorous process for kernel updates, from upstream release to production deployment, including internal testing, phased rollouts, and the use of employee traffic for validation. The post also highlights the development of automated systems like 'unimog' for traffic management during reboots and 'Reboau' for control plane kernel maintenance, ensuring consistent security across the entire infrastructure.
More from the Hardware Infrastructure & Performance Optimization trail
- How we reduced core unit boot time from hours to minutes
- A one-line Kubernetes fix that saved 600 hours a year
- Launching Cloudflare’s Gen 13 servers- trading cache for cores for 2x edge compute performance
- Inside Gen 13- how we built our most powerful server yet
- So long, and thanks for all the fish- how to escape the Linux networking stack