Database Threats and Countermeasures
One of the most critical assets of your business is the data it generates every day. It is natural to collect a lot of data pertaining to your customers and on your day-to-day operations, and these are kept in databases, which must be useful in handling the data and automating different functions outside and within your business. Given its importance, it makes sense to take measures to protect it at all costs. Otherwise, you risk losing it and damaging your reputation, especially when it puts your company and your customer’s security at risk. Thus, data security is often one of the main objectives of a database management system.
To create a robust and secure database management system, you need to recognize the various threats to your database and establish countermeasures against them. We’ve listed some of the most common database threats and what you can do to mitigate them:
SQL injection – This is an attack caused by malicious code in the web (front-end) applications, and it ends up in the back-end database. It lets cyber criminals obtain unlimited access to the data stored in your database. To prevent that, consider using stored procedures rather than direct queries, and implement an MVC architecture.
Too much database privileges – People who use or have access to your database will have different privileges. Some of them are likely to abuse that, resulting in unnecessary risk. A good countermeasure is to uphold and deploy a strict privileges control and access policy and avoid granting too much privilege to your team. Moreover, be sure to revoke privileges when they become outdated.
Unprotected database backups – It is mandatory to make backups of your databases, but make sure they are protected from attacks and security breaches, resulting in data leaks. Consider auditing both the backups and the database to see who is trying to access the data, and keep them encrypted at all costs.
Poor audit trail – Improper database auditing puts you at risk of noncompliance with international and national data protection regulations. Keep in mind that all events within your database must be registered and recorded automatically. So, consider automatic auditing solutions, but make sure they will not burden the database performance.
DBHawk is a robust platform that can make it easier to set countermeasures and protect your databases in the long run. It is helpful in database security, auditing, and access control data masking. It can be used to access databases securely no matter where you host them while delivering a centralized solution for monitoring the database.
