Brian Kelley

Brian Kelley is an author, columnist, and Microsoft SQL Server MVP focusing primarily on SQL Server security. He is a contributing author for How to Cheat at Securing SQL Server 2005 (Syngress), Professional SQL Server 2008 Administration (Wrox), and Introduction to SQL Server (Texas Publishing). Brian currently serves as an infrastructure and security architect. He has also served as a senior Microsoft SQL Server DBA, database architect, developer, and incident response team lead.

Interests: Chess, Reading, Soccer (Football), Baseball, Animals, Theology

Bad Admins: Taking Advantage of Maintenance Periods

by Brian Kelley

Databases – Infrastructure – Security

This is part of a series of tips on how bad/rogue admins can get access to the data in your...

2011-07-25

1,067 reads

Bad Admins: Stealing the SQL Server Service Account

by Brian Kelley

Databases – Infrastructure – Security

This is part of a series of tips on how bad/rogue admins can get access to the data in your...

2011-07-22

1,382 reads

Bad Admins: Pocketing Backups

by Brian Kelley

Databases – Infrastructure – Security

This is part of a series of tips on how bad/rogue admins can get access to the data in your...

2011-07-21

738 reads

Gaining Speaker Experience Credentials, Part II

by Brian Kelley

Databases – Infrastructure – Security

In a previous post I gave suggestions on how to get speaking credentials for consideration at a larger event, such...

2011-07-21

955 reads

Bad Admins: Stealing An Account

by Brian Kelley

Databases – Infrastructure – Security

Yesterday I posted about manipulating group membership to get access to a SQL Server. Today comes attack vector #2: stealing an...

2011-07-14

1,200 reads

Bad Admins: Attacking via Group Membership

by Brian Kelley

Databases – Infrastructure – Security

This is a series of blog posts about how administrators can gain access to SQL Server, even if you try...

2011-07-13

1,881 reads

Gaining Speaker Experience Credentials

by Brian Kelley

Databases – Infrastructure – Security

One of the things I saw on Twitter yesterday was several folks saying their abstract submissions had been turned down...

2011-06-16

1,908 reads

Speaking at the 2011 PASS Summit

by Brian Kelley

Databases – Infrastructure – Security

The emails came in today and 2 out of 4 of my sessions were selected. Both are the ones I...

2011-06-15

897 reads

Planning Your Upgrade Well

by Brian Kelley

Databases – Infrastructure – Security

Yesterday I talked about the importance of having a tested business recovery plan. If you didn't read yesterday's post, the...

2011-06-07

972 reads

The Importance of a Business Recovery Plan

by Brian Kelley

Databases – Infrastructure – Security

Recently I was in one of those chain restaurants (the middle-priced, sit-down types) and shortly after we got there, we...

2011-06-06

1,904 reads

Blogs

Experimenting with CHOOSE: #SQLNewBlogger

I was looking over the CHOOSE() function while editing an article at SQL Server...

Fighting Procrastination?

By Brian Kelley

Here is another short video (~ 15 minutes). This is by the author of...

A Fun Prize at the PASS Data Community Summit

I had a briefing for the 2026 PASS Data Community Summit, which is just...

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Forums

SQL Server 2025 Server-level Roles

By Steve Jones - SSC Editor

Comments posted to this topic are about the item SQL Server 2025 Server-level Roles

Stairway to DAX and Power BI - Level 29: The DAX Combine & Aggregate Functions

By Bill Pearson

Comments posted to this topic are about the item Stairway to DAX and Power...

AI Is Improving Security

By Steve Jones - SSC Editor

Comments posted to this topic are about the item AI Is Improving Security

Visit the forum

Question of the Day

SQL Server 2025 Server-level Roles

In SQL Server 2022+, what does the ##MS_DatabaseConnector## role allow?

See possible answers