SQL 2005 Encryption (Novice)

[bfpt3]

I am running SQL 2005 on a Windows Server 2003 platform. My dilemma is as follows:

I have a third party document management system that connects to the database engine. I cannot alter the tables within the database however, I need to encrypt the sensitive table within (Legislative reasons). I need to know how to encrypt a column of data.

I understand how to create the Database master key, the certificates, and the Symmetric keys. I do not understand how to force the database to encrypt the data going in and decrypt coming out. Any insight is greatly appreciated.

[skhanal]

Type of encryption depends on who are you trying to protect the data against. One option is to encrypt the data files, there are appliances (such as Decru) and software (vometric) available for them. There are other vendors that encrypt the database.

Netlib may be of interest to you http://www.netlib.com/

[bfpt3]

I am currently looking at NetLib. I have tested their product and it works really well. I wanted to see if anyone had suggestions for using SQL 2005 Encryption to complete this task.

I am trying to make sure that if security is circumvented the data would be unreadable.

[Island1]

Why not set up a dummmy user without permissions - and see "what he sees" to ascertain effectiveness of the solution?

HTH,

Bill

[MAK]

you could encrypt columns in sql server 2005. Then you could create a procedure that decrypts the data. And allow application to use only that procedure.