Chapter 1: General Security Best Practices

Overview

Securing the database may be the single biggest action an organization can take in proactively defending itself against the myriad of unforeseen hostile intruders. Databases are the vaults that hold an organization’s most valuable digital assets. Compromise of these assets can lead to negative publicity, litigation, lost revenue, loss of customer trust, and many other negative results.

Securing your databases may sound like a simple task, but there are many things you have to understand to do this effectively; and many of the actions and much of the knowledge doesn’t even involve technology! Unlike the following chapters, which focus on Oracle database security with lots of sample code, the discussion in this chapter is high level (without any code) and meant to explain the principles and concepts that the examples in the following chapters will adhere to.

This chapter outlines my philosophy on cyber security and fundamental security best practices. These concepts are important as they serve as the guiding principles for understanding and employing effective security. This chapter will paint the security landscape by outlining the processes and defining the concepts, principles, and challenges for implementing effective security. While not meant to be a complete guide to all the security issues, material presented here can serve either as a security primer or as a reminder of the things that should be considered.