SQL Ledger: Protecting Data in Azure SQL
Learn how you can set up and use Ledger tables in an Azure SQL Database to verify the integrity of your database changes.
2022-09-07
4,085 reads
security
Can We Please Stop Sending Passwords Over the Wire?
While analyzing SQL Server's network protocol, I came across a weird fact: when a database client logs in using SQL Server authentication (as opposed to Windows authentication), it has to send the user's password to the server, in blatant violation of common security guidelines. At first, I couldn't believe it; SQL Server generally does an […]
2022-03-02
5,123 reads
Query control made easy
Overview As we all know, data security is a never-ending battle. Every day, we hear of new data breaches. It's a hard problem, and there is no single solution, other than a defense in depth. Let's look at one of those defenses for databases: query control. Query control is a simple idea: most applications access […]
2022-01-07
3,846 reads
SQL Server Data Classification Comes Alive
Overview Microsoft SQL Server 2012 introduced a feature called data classification, which allows you to mark certain columns with labels, indicating that these columns contain sensitive or special-handling data. For instance, you may want to mark a column containing credit card numbers as "confidential", or sales numbers as "management only". The problem is that you […]
2021-12-10
4,870 reads
SQL Server Data Masking: a comparison with Gallium Data
Introduction In SQL Server 2016, Microsoft introduced a new feature called dynamic data masking, which allows you to mask the values of certain columns and keep that data hidden from certain users, without having to modify your applications. Let's take a look at how SQL Server does data masking, and compare it to the way Gallium Data […]
2021-12-03
1,682 reads
Ransomware: A world under threat
Ransomware has threatened many organizations over the past few years. In this article, Robert Sheldon explains the history of ransomware and what needs to be done to protect against it.
2021-11-22
SQL Server Row-Level Security: A Comparison with Gallium Data
A quick look at how the native SQL Server Row-Level Security compares with Gallium Data's solution for limiting access to rows of data.
2021-11-15
2,894 reads
State of Database Monitoring Report 3
Database professionals are spending 1/3 of their time on security tasks each day and say it’s their biggest professional challenge this year. Learn how 2500+ database professionals are reacting to these unprecedented demands in our third database monitoring insights report.
2021-11-08
Cybersecurity threats
Not a week goes by without news of a new cyberattack. In this article, Robert Sheldon explains the cybersecurity threats in today’s world.
2021-10-29
Azure Databricks Access Controls and Row Level Security
Azure Databricks has a number of Access Controls and Row Level Security options that we will explore in this article.
2021-06-18
Blogs
Check your regions people
Today I was having a nice discussion with some colleagues about Fabric and pricing/licensing...
Using Git Prune–#SQLNewBlogger
By Steve Jones
As I’ve been working with SQL Saturday and managing changes to events, I’ve accumulated...
Microsoft Purview new data governance features
By James Serra
Starting last week is a rollout of the public preview of a new and...
Forums
Read Only Replica in SQL Server Standard
By Stewart "Arturius" Campbell
Comments posted to this topic are about the item Read Only Replica in SQL...
Identifying Customer Buying Pattern in Power BI - Part 1
Comments posted to this topic are about the item Identifying Customer Buying Pattern in...
Backup of encrypted databases failing
I've had some backups of my encrypted databases failing with the error "BACKUP 'DBName'...
Question of the Day
Read Only Replica in SQL Server Standard
Our environment runs using SQL Server Standard. We are implementing Availability groups. Our database has been experiencing high read volumes, so I want to let the application read the Synchronized Secondary replica, as I read that HADR does this. Can we implement this?
See possible answers