Secure Database Service

This report explores a novel paradigm for data management in which a third party service provider hosts database as a service, providing its customers seamless mechanisms to create, store, and access their databases at the host site. Such a model alleviates the need for organizations to purchase expensive hardware and software, deal with software upgrades, and hire professionals for administrative and maintenance tasks which are taken over by the service provider, thereby freeing them to concentrate on their core businesses. One of the most critical challenges introduced by database as a service is the provision for a secure database service, which is the focus of this report. Various alternative solutions proposed so far, based on data encryption, and the problems relating to them are surveyed. The limited support for database encryption in commercial products like Oracle is investigated. Further, a model for secure database service, based upon the fundamental concepts of Distributed Databases is detailed. This model tries to counter the problems inherent in solutions based upon database encryption.