Database security is the primary concern of any business. Securing the data needs the right set of knowledge and technical know-how. Organizations fail to realize the importance of this step and end up with critical security risks. Cyberattacks mainly focus to gain access to databases and steal or corrupt your data. They can also download sensitive information if your database is insecure.
But what are the database security threats and vulnerabilities? Here is a list for you.
- SQL injection
- Denial of service (DoS)
- Database misconfigurations
- Unprotected and unmanaged sensitive data
- Weak audit trails
So, what can we do to ensure database security? Here are some of the best practices that can help you secure the data of your organization.
- Tight database management systems
- Real-time activity monitoring
- Physical database security
- Encrypt sensitive data
- Multiple database servers
- Vulnerability and configurations assessment
- Implementing privilege censoring
- Security and compliance policies
- Setup database and web access firewalls
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Real-Time Activity Monitoring
The actual database security of any organization should be under constant surveillance of the business. As multiple entities access data on a daily basis, the tech teams need to be aware of who is accessing what data. Database monitoring softwares can be used to do this task. It can inform the concerned people of any breaches, potential attacks, maintain escalation protocols, and track data usage.
Encrypt Sensitive Data
Encryption is one of the sage methods to ensure database security. Strong encryption should be used for more sensitive and relevant data in the database. Businesses can achieve encryption with different methods as listed.
- Transport layer security (TSL) encryption
- Disk encryption
- Column-level encryption
- DES encryption
- 3DES
- AES encryption
- RSA encryption
Implementing Privilege Censoring
Implementing privilege censoring basically controls access to databases by individuals inside the organization. This step ensures proper control over data access and viewability inside the organization. Database administrators and security teams should filter the people based on their roles and responsibilities to give access. Some questions they can ask themselves are:
- Who needs access?
- How much data can the person view?
- Can they make changes to the database?
- Should the person have limited or unlimited access to the data?
- If for a duration, how long the person should have access?
- Who can give or take data access to the employees?
- Should developers gain full access?
By properly restricting access to the database, you can ensure the database security of your data.
