Database Security, 25 August 2009

Lab 6 of IT security courses is about database security. We are required to perform lab tasks according to lab sheets by using MySQL. En.Mohd Zaki has guided us in the installation of MySQL. At first, we are failed to install MySQL using common installation method. However, finally we have successfully install MySQL by using command prompt. Before run MySQL, I have reset a new password by type following command in command prompt:

SET PASSWORD FOR root@localhost=OLD_PASSWORD(‘abc123’);

After that, I start to use MySQL to create an account database and then create a records table which includes attributes of CustomerName, Account-Number, Balance, CreditRating. Follow by, I create user table with attributes of Customer, Clerk, Manager. After finish creating database and table, I define an access structure according to situation given.

Customers can read their own account

- Customer will be set the access to user. Set read only privileges for customer.

Clerk can read all fields other than CreditRating and update Balance for all account

- Customer will be set the access to user. Set read and write privileges for clerk other than CreditRating and update Balance for all account

Manager can create new records, read all fields, and update CreaditRating for all accounts.

- Manager will be set the access to administrator. Set full access privileges read and write for all accounts for manager.

At the end of this practical section, I understand the importance of security issues specifically in database systems and the problem related to information protection besides investigate the potential implementation of security mechanism in the database management system and operating system.