Oracle Server Security, Important Concerns!!

 Author: Christopher Robb

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Keeping the data and system secure is priority of every organization but unfortunately almost every organization leaves some door open for the attackers. It is the responsibility of every Oracle database administrator to keep their database secure. Today we will discuss some important concerns that will help you lessen or eliminate the threats and the consequences of a security breach for your Oracle server.

Oracle Server Security Attacks:

Basically Oracle Server Security attacks can be divided into below categories.

1. Intrusion:

In Intrusion attacks an attacker logs in to a system remotely and acquires the privileges of either a regular user or a super user. Databases more vulnerable to this security breach are those that allow someone who know your password to make SSH connections from the internet and the remotely exploitable systems where exploits such as a buffer overflow are written and executed on Unix services and give a shell prompt to the executer of the exploit.

2. Accessing Sensitive Data:

Another Oracle Server Security attack can be where an attacker does not actually breaks the system. Instead the sensitive information is accessed by exploiting some remotely accessible programs. Oracle Databases more vulnerable to these types of attacks are those where you can send specially crafted SQL statements via forms to access data that you are not allowed to access.

3. Denial of Service (DoS):

This is the case where a system is overloaded by sending too much traffic that it is unable to respond to any more requests.

4. Distributed Denial of Service:

In this type of Oracle Server Security problem a number of systems across the internet work together to DoS some other server.

Preventing Oracle Server Security Attacks:

Here are some tips that will help you prevent Oracle Server Security attacks.

1. Secure Configuration:

Remember secure configuration is a very strong first line of defense for any database. Always use industry-standard security practices for installing Oracle databases.

2. Disable Remote Access:

First of all you need to determine if you really need to allow remote access on your Oracle database. I recommend you to never allow remote access. Consider a web server that has TCP port 80 and TCP port 443 ports for HTTP and HTTPS but remote access can only be done through virtual private networks (VPN). This greatly reduces the chances of intrusion on your Oracle server as the only source of external intrusion can be through the apache web server. Continued...

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