2025-10-15
100 reads
Security
The Security of Old Tech
Older technology can introduce security issues, along with performance ones. Keeping your systems somewhat up to date is important for security.
2025-09-12
63 reads
Password Guidance
Passwords are essential and also a problem in many organizations. Guidance has changed over the years and Steve has a few thoughts on what's recommended today.
2025-09-10
121 reads
Zero-Trust Architecture for Cloud-Based AI Systems
Zero-Trust Architecture (ZTA) emerges as a strong security paradigm for cloud-based AI systems, fundamentally operating on the principle of “never trust, always verify.” Unlike conventional security models, ZTA assumes potential compromise exists within the network and requires continuous verification of every access request regardless of origin.
2025-07-09
Cloning Master Admin User Permissions in Amazon RDS for SQL Server with Fine-Grained Control
This article explores how to securely clone the master user permissions in Amazon RDS for SQL Server using a custom stored procedure, usp_rds_clone_login. It outlines a step-by-step process to generate, review, and apply a script that replicates server- and database-level access from the master user to a new login without directly exposing elevated credentials. The guide emphasizes the principle of least privilege, supports named account management, and enables transparent, auditable permission handling for DBAs and applications. Designed for secure and scalable environments, this solution enhances operational security while maintaining administrative flexibility in Amazon RDS.
2025-07-09
554 reads
Are Data Breaches Inevitable?
Steve examines the idea that we might all have a data breach at some point.
2025-05-16
82 reads
More Supply Chain Attacks
Code is vulnerable to supply chain attacks, which aren't something many of us think about.
2025-03-21
95 reads
Lower Your Attack Surface Area
We all know security is important, but we sometimes make the job harder when we don't handle data appropriately.
2025-03-19
154 reads
List the Databases To Which You Have Access
Explanation: sys.databases contains information about all databases on the SQL Server instance. • HAS_DBACCESS(name) = 1 filters out the databases you dont have access to. •ORDER BY name sorts the result alphabetically.
2025-03-04
296 reads
Is Ransomware Fading?
There is a report that less ransomware ransom is being paid. Perhaps that's a good sign for all of us.
2025-02-19
74 reads
Blogs
Finding the Last Last Name in SQL: #SQLNewBlogger
By Steve Jones
I wrote a piece on the new SUBSTRING in SQL Server 2025 and got...
SQL Server 2025 GAs Today
By Steve Jones
If you aren’t watching the Ignite keynotes today, then you might have missed the...
Run SQL Server 2025 and SQL Server Management Studio on macOS Tahoe
Short version You want to get this running as fast as possible. Do these...
Forums
Email change does not work
I changed my email address in Edit Profile page, but it has no effect...
The case for "Understanding our business" training
Comments posted to this topic are about the item The case for "Understanding our...
Specifying the Collation
Comments posted to this topic are about the item Specifying the Collation
Question of the Day
Specifying the Collation
I am dealing with issues on my SQL Server 2022 instance related to collation. I have an instance collation of Latin1_General_CS_AS_KS_WS, but a database collation of Latin1_General_CI_AS. I want to force a few queries to run with a specified collation by using code like this:
DECLARE @c VARCHAR(20) = 'Latin1_General_CI_AS'
SELECT p.PersonType,
p.Title,
p.LastName,
c.CustomerID,
c.AccountNumber
FROM Person.Person AS p
INNER JOIN Sales.Customer AS c
ON c.PersonID = p.BusinessEntityID
COLLATE @c
Will this solve my problem? See possible answers