The Power of Autonomous Database Security

“The most secure database is the one having no users connected.” You can quote me on that, I have learned it the hard way – from experience.

Database security in short means protecting the data. Markus Strauss’ article on Traditional Database Security reveals exactly the same.

Let us look into 3 recent examples of where data was not very well protected (to put it mildly), covered by CNN and CNBC:

– An entire nation just got hacked: records of more than 5 million Bulgarians got stolen by hackers from the country’s tax revenue office.

– A hacker gained access to 100 million Capital One credit card applications and accounts: in one of the biggest data breaches ever, a hacker gained access to more than 100 million Capital One customers’ accounts and credit card applications earlier this year.

– Marriott says its Starwood database was hacked for approximately 500 million guests: “The Marriott just revealing a massive data breach involving guest reservation database at its Starwood brand. Marriott says it was unauthorized access since 2014. This includes up to 500 million guests… For approximately 327 million of these guests, the information that was exposed includes a combination of name, mailing address, phone number, email address, you ready for this – passport number… Starwood preferred guest account information, date of birth, gender, arrival and departure information… including reservation dates and communication preference. As you know, when you go to a hotel, especially internationally, they take your passport. Often times, they take a copy of your passport.”

So, granted traditional database security does not protect data well, how about looking into something new, innovative and at the same time something which has been developed and improved for more than 40 years? The Oracle Autonomous Database might be the answer (arguably is the answer). Tom Haunert’s interview with Vipin Samar (SVP of Database Security) gives an excellent overview of what Autonomous Database Security is all about.

Here is a list of 10 security benefits of Oracle’s Autonomous Database (benefits over any other database for all it matters):

1. There is no DBA access, no root access, no Operating System access… Still you can create users, roles, etc. just as before. But certain the commands are blacklisted.
2. There are no customer-managed keys: Oracle manages the keys.
3. Oracle automatically applies all security updates/patches to ensure data is not vulnerable to known attack vectors.
4. All data is encrypted using transparent data encryption.
5. Still database security features such as Virtual Private Database and Data Redaction are available.
6. Network connections from clients to the Autonomous Database are also encrypted using the client credentials wallet.
7. Data is encrypted everywhere: SQL*Net traffic, data in tablespaces and data in backups.
8. It is now possible to specify an access control list that blocks all IP addresses that are not in the list from accessing the database.
9. Oracle has been engaging with external assessment entities and independent auditors to meet a broad set of international and industry-specific compliance standards for service deployments in Oracle Cloud such as ISO 27001, SOC1, SOC2, PCI DSS, HIPAA/HITECH, and FedRAMP.
10. All operations are being audited.

The first one above is rather controversial point of debate among the DBA community. In order to ensure the security and the performance of the Autonomous Database, some SQL commands are restricted: ADMINISTER KEY MANAGEMENT, ALTER PROFILE, ALTER TABLESPACE, CREATE DATABASE LINK, CREATE PROFILE, CREATE TABLESPACE, DROP TABLESPACE. For DB links, you should use DBMS_CLOUD_ADMIN.CREATE_DATABASE_LINK to create database links in ADB.

Several DBA statements are restricted: ALTER PLUGGABLE DATABASE, ALTER DATABASE, ALTER SYSTEM, ALTER SESSION, ALTER USER, ALTER TABLE, CREATE TABLE and CREATE USER. To ensure the security and the performance of Autonomous Database, some Oracle XML DB features are also restricted. Same holds for Oracle Text, Oracle Spatial and Graph and APEX.

Oracle ADB is a database which is both Autonomous and Secure and as Mike Faden says: from self-securing database cloud services to the new cloud perimeter, Oracle technology protects your most valuable investment—your data.

And here are the 4 Areas of Self-Securing of Autonomous Database:

– Self-securing starts with the security of the Oracle Cloud infrastructure and database service. Security patches are automatically applied every quarter or as needed, narrowing the window of vulnerability. Patching includes the full stack: firmware, operating system [OS], clusterware, and database. There are no steps required from the customer side.
– Oracle encrypt customer data everywhere: in motion, at rest, and in backups. The encryption keys are managed automatically, without requiring any customer intervention. And encryption cannot be turned off.
– Administrator activity on Oracle Autonomous Data Warehouse Cloud is logged centrally and monitored for any abnormal activities. Oracle have enabled database auditing using predefined policies so that customers can view logs for any abnormal access: UNIFIED_AUDIT_TRAIL
– Built upon Oracle Database Vault, unique to Oracle Cloud, operations personnel have privilege to do all administrative tasks without any ability to ever see any customer data.

And finally something about the passwords in the Oracle Autonomous Database. They still have to be carefully chosen. Because as people say, “passwords are like underwear: make them personal, make them exotic, and change them on a regular basis.”