Chapter 5

Database Integrity &

Security
OVERVIEW OF DATABASE SECURITY
Privacy – Ethical and legal rights that individuals have with
regard to control over the dissemination and user of their
personal information.
Database security – Protection of information contained
in the database against unauthorized access, modification
or destruction.
Database integrity – Mechanism that is applied to ensure
that the data in the database is correct and consistent.

Database integrity & Security 2

 …CON’T
A good database security management system has:
data independence, shared access, minimal redundancy, data
consistency, and data integrity
A good database security management system also has the
following characteristics:
Privacy signifies that an unauthorized user cannot disclose data
Integrity ensures that an unauthorized user cannot modify data.
Availability ensures that data be made available to the
authorized user unfailingly
Copyright ensures the native rights of individuals as a creator of
information.
Validity ensures activities to be accountable by law.

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Database integrity & Security
 …CON’T
Database system can effectively prevent accidental
security and integrity threats from:
System error,
Improper authorization and
Concurrent usage anomalies.
 The levels of security protection, it may start from organization &
administrative security, physical & personnel security, communication
security and Information systems security.
 Database security and integrity is about protecting the database from
being inconsistent and being disrupted.
We can also call it database misuse.
 Database misuse could be Intentional or Accidental, where accidental
misuse is easier to cope with than intentional misuse.
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Database integrity & Security
 …CON’T
Accidental inconsistency could occur due to:
 System crash during transaction processing
 Anomalies due to concurrent access
 Anomalies due to redundancy
 Logical errors
Intentional misuse could be:
 Unauthorized reading of data
 Unauthorized modification of data or
 Unauthorized destruction of data
 Most systems implement good Database Integrity
to protect the system from accidental misuse.
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Database integrity & Security
 Levels of Security Measures
 Security measures can be implemented at several levels and for different
components of the system.
 These levels are:
1. Physical Level: concerned with securing the site containing the computer system.
 The backup systems should also be physically protected from access except for authorized users.

2. Human Level: concerned with authorization of database users for access the content
at different levels and privileges.
3. Operating System: concerned with the weakness and strength of the operating
system security on data files.
 This also includes protection of data in primary and secondary memory from unauthorized access.

4. Database System: concerned with data access limit enforced by the database
system.
 Access limit like password

5. Application Level: Since almost all database systems allow remote access through
terminals or networks, software-level security with the network software is as
important as physical security, both on the Internet and networks private to an
enterprise.
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Database integrity & Security
 …CON’T
We can have different levels of security and authorization
on data objects and users, who access which data is a
policy matter rather than technical.
These policies
should be known by the system: should be encoded in the
system.
should be remembered: should be saved somewhere (the
catalogue)

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Database integrity & Security
 …CON’T
Database Integrity constraints contribute to maintaining
a secure database system by preventing data from
becoming invalid and hence giving misleading or
incorrect results.
Domain Integrity means that each column in any table will
have set of allowed values and can not assume any value
other than the one specified in the domain.
Entity Integrity means that in each table the primary key
(which may be composite) satisfies both of two conditions:
1. That the primary key is unique within the table and
2. That the primary key column(s) contains no null values.
 Referential Integrity means that the RDBMS must be set up so as to
take appropriate actions to spread a change—in one table—from that
table to the other tables where the change must also occur.
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Database integrity & Security
 Security Issues and general
considerations
 Legal, ethical and social issues regarding the right to access information
 Physical control issues regarding how to keep the database physically
secured.
 Policy issues regarding privacy of individual level at enterprise and national
level
 Operational consideration on the techniques used (password, etc) to
access and manipulate the database
 System level security including operating system and hardware control

 The designer and the administrator of a database should first

identify the possible threat that might be faced by the system in
order to take counter measures.
 Threat may be any situation or event, whether intentional or
accidental, that may adversely affect a system and consequently
the organization. 9
Database integrity & Security
 …CON’T
A threat may be caused by a situation or
event involving a person, action, or
circumstance that is likely to bring harm to an
organization
The harm to an organization may be tangible
or intangible
Tangible – loss of hardware, software, or data
Intangible – loss of credibility or client
confidence

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Database integrity & Security
 …CON’T
 Examples of threats:  Staff shortages or strikes
 Using another persons’ means of access  Inadequate staff training
 Unauthorized amendment/modification or  Viewing and disclosing
copying of data unauthorized data
 Program alteration(making different)  Electronic interference and
 Inadequate policies and procedures that radiation
allow a mix of confidential and normal out  Data corruption owing to power
put loss or surge
 Wire-tapping  Fire (electrical fault, lightning
 Ilegal entry by hacker strike, arson), flood, bomb
 Blackmail  Physical damage to equipment
 Theft of data, programs, and equipment  Breaking cables or disconnection
 Failure of security mechanisms, giving of cables
greater access than normal  Introduction of viruses

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Database integrity & Security
 Countermeasures: Computer Based Controls

 The following are computer-based security controls for a multi-user

environment:
 Authorization
 The granting of a right or privilege that enables a subject to have legal
access to a system or a system’s object.
 Authorization controls can be built into the software, and govern not
only what system or object a specified user can access, but also what
the user may do with it
 Authorization controls are sometimes referred to as access controls
 The process of authorization involves authentication of subjects (i.e. a
user or program) requesting access to objects (i.e. a database table,
view, procedure, trigger, or any other object that can be created within
the system)

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Database integrity & Security
 …CON’T
Views
A view is the dynamic result of one or more relational
operations on the base relations to produce another
relation.
A view is a virtual relation that does not actually exist in the
database, but is produced upon request by a particular user
The view mechanism provides a powerful and flexible
security mechanism by hiding parts of the database from
certain users
Using a view is more restrictive than simply having certain
privileges granted to a user on the base relation(s).

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Database integrity & Security
 …CON’T
 Backup and recovery
 Backup is the process of periodically taking a copy of the database and
log file (and possibly programs) on to offline storage media.
 Database recovery is the process of restoring the database to a correct
state in the event of a failure.
 Journaling is the process of keeping and maintaining a log file (or
journal) of all changes made to the database to enable recovery to be
undertaken effectively in the event of a failure.
 The advantage of journaling is that, in the event of a failure, the
database can be recovered to its last known consistent state using a
backup copy of the database and the information contained in the log
file.
 If no journaling is enabled on a failed system, the only means of
recovery is to restore the database using the latest backup version of
the database

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Database integrity & Security
 …CON’T
Integrity
Integrity constraints contribute to maintaining a secure database
system by preventing data from becoming invalid and hence
giving misleading or incorrect results.
Domain Integrity: setting the allowed set of values
Entity integrity: demanding Primary key values not to assume a
NULL value.
Referential integrity: enforcing Foreign Key values to have a value
that already exist in the corresponding Candidate Key attribute(s)
or be NULL.

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Database integrity & Security
 Encryption
Encryption is used to protect information stored at a
particular site or transmitted between sites from being
accessed by unauthorized users.
Encryption is the encoding of the data by a special algorithm
that renders the data unreadable by any program without the
decryption key.
It is not possible for encrypted data to be read unless the
reader knows how to decipher/decrypt the encrypted data.
The DBMS can access data after decoding it, although there
is a degradation in performance because of the time taken to
decode it.
Encryption also protects data transmitted over
communication lines.
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Database integrity & Security
 …CON’T
 To transmit data securely over insecure networks requires the use of a
Cryptosystem, which includes:
1. An encryption key to encrypt the data (plaintext)
2. An encryption algorithm that, with the encryption key, transforms the
plaintext into ciphertext
3. A decryption key to decrypt the ciphertext
4. A decryption algorithm that, with the decryption key, transforms the
ciphertext back into plaintext

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Database integrity & Security
 Types of Cryptosystems
Cryptosystems can be categorized into two:
1. Symmetric encryption – uses the same key for both
encryption and decryption and relies on safe
communication lines for exchanging the key.

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Database integrity & Security
 …CON’T
2. Asymmetric encryption – uses different keys for encryption
and decryption e.g. RSA(Rivest–Shamir–Adleman)

Generally, symmetric algorithms are much faster to execute

on a computer than those that are asymmetric.
In the contrary, asymmetric algorithms are more secure
than symmetric algorithms. 19
Database integrity & Security
 RAID technology (Redundant Array of
Independent Disks)
 The main hardware components that should be fault-tolerant
include disk drives, disk controllers, CPU, power supplies, and
cooling fans.
 Disk drives are the most vulnerable(attackable) components
with the shortest times between failures of any of the hardware
components.
 RAID works on having a large disk array comprising an
arrangement of several independent disks that are organized to
improve reliability and at same time increase performance
 Performance is increased through data striping

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Database integrity & Security
 …CON’T
Data striping – the data is segmented into equal size
partitions (the striping unit) which are transparently
distributed across multiple disks.
Data striping stores data across multiple disks

Figure: Data striping File A striped across four disks

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Database integrity & Security
Security at different Levels of Data
 Almost all RDBMSs provide security at different levels and formats of
data.
This includes:-
1. Relation Level: permission to have access to a specific relation.
2. View Level: permission to data included in the view and not in the
named relations
3. Hybrid (Relation/View): the case where only part of a single
relation is made available to users through View.
 Any database access request will have the following three major
components:-
1. Requested Operation: what kind of operation is requested by a
specific query?
2. Requested Object: on which resource or data of the database is the
operation required to be applied?
3. Requesting User: who is the user requesting the operation on the
specified object? 22
Database integrity & Security
 Authentication
All users of the database will have different access levels
and permission for different data objects.
Is the process of checking whether the user is the one with
the privilege for the access level.
Each user is given a unique identifier, which is used by the
operating system to determine who they are.
Thus the system will check whether the user with a specific
username and password is trying to use the resource.
Associated with each identifier is a password, chosen by
the user and known to the operation system, which must
be supplied to enable the operating system to
authenticate who the user claims to be.
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Database integrity & Security
 Authorization/Privilege
Authorization refers to the process that determines the
mode in which a particular (previously authenticated)
client is allowed to access a specific resource controlled by
a server.
Authorization is implemented by using Views.
Views are unnamed relations containing part of one or
more base relations creating a customized/personalized
view for different users.

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Database integrity & Security
 …CON’T
Forms of user authorization
 There are different forms of user authorization on the resource of the
database.
 These forms are privileges on what operations are allowed on a specific
data object.
User authorization on the data/extension
1. Read Authorization: the user with this privilege is allowed only to read the content
of the data object.
2. Insert Authorization: the user with this privilege is allowed only to insert new
records or items to the data object.
3. Update Authorization: users with this privilege are allowed to modify content of
attributes but are not authorized to delete the records.
4. Delete Authorization: users with this privilege are only allowed to delete a record
and not anything else.
 Different users, depending on the power of the user, can have one or the
combination of the above forms of authorization on different data objects.
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Database integrity & Security
 …CON’T
User authorization on the database schema
1. Index Authorization: deals with permission to create
as well as delete an index table for relation.
2. Resource Authorization: deals with permission to
add/create a new relation in the database.
3. Alteration Authorization: deals with permission to add
as well as delete attribute.
4. Drop Authorization: deals with permission to delete
and existing relation.

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Database integrity & Security
 Role of DBA in Database Security
 The database administrator is responsible to make the database to be as
secure as possible and have the most powerful privilege than every other
user.
 The DBA provides capability for database users while accessing the
content of the database.
 The major responsibilities of DBA in relation to authorization of users are:
1. Account Creation: involves creating different accounts for different USERS as
well as USER GROUPS.
2. Security Level Assignment: involves in assigning different users at different
categories of access levels.
3. Privilege Grant: involves giving different levels of privileges for different
users and user groups.
4. Privilege Revocation: involves denying or canceling previously granted
privileges for users due to various reasons.
5. Account Deletion: involves in deleting an existing account of users or user
groups. Is similar with denying all privileges of users on the database.
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Database integrity & Security
 Approaches to Database Security
There are two broader approaches to database security
mechanisms:
1) Discretionary security mechanisms
 Grant different privileges to different users and user groups on various
data objects
 The privilege is to access different data objects
 The mode of the privilege could be:
 Read,
 Insert,
 Delete,
 Update files, records or fields.
 Is more flexible

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Database integrity & Security
 …CON’T
2) Mandatory security mechanisms
Enforce multilevel security
classifying data and users into various security classes (or levels) and
implementing the appropriate security policy of the organization.
Each data object will have certain classification level
Each user is given certain clearance level
Only users who can pass the clearance level can access the data object
Is comparatively not-flexible/rigid
 The ability to classify user into a hierarchy of groups provide a powerful
tool for administering large systems with thousands of users and objects.
 A database system can support one or both of the security mechanisms
to protect the data.

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Database integrity & Security
 Statistical Database Security
 Statistical databases contain information about individuals which
may not be permitted to be seen by others as individual records.
 Such databases may contain information about various populations.

 Example: Medical Records, Personal Data like address, salary, etc

 Such kind of databases should have special security mechanisms so

that confidential information about people will not be disclosed for
many users.
 Thus statistical databases should have additional security techniques
which will protect the retrieval of individual records.
 Only queries with statistical aggregate functions like Average, Sum,
Min, Max, Standard Deviation, Mid, Count, etc should be executed.

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Database integrity & Security
END
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