CODEWITHSUNDEEP
sql-server-2012azure-sql-databasealways-encrypted
prasanth
prasanth

Reputation: 483

Data encryption for few columns in a table

We are building an application using .NET and SQL Server 2012. Currently it works fine. For some new changes we want to encrypt few sensitive columns in the tables and also want to move the to SQL Azure.

Was Googling and found that SQL Server 2016 has a new feature - "Always Encrypted" which requires .NET 4.6 & SSMS version to be 13.0+

Now that I am using SQL Server 2012 is there a way to make use of Always encrypted feature while moving to Azure? Any workarounds / alternatives / pointers on this would help.

Upvotes: 0

Views: 195

Answers (2)

Jakub Szymaszek - Microsoft
Jakub Szymaszek - Microsoft

Reputation: 596

I'm a Program Manager at Microsoft. Just to confirm/add to what Shannon stated:

Always Encrypted is supported in SQL Server 2016 and in Azure SQL Database and the feature is identical on both platforms. Here is a tutorial with an Always Encrypted example for Azure SQL DB: https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/documentation/articles/sql-database-always-encrypted/.

You can also use Always Encrypted in a SQL Server Virtual Machine in Azure(https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/services/virtual-machines/sql-server/), if you choose to provision SQL Server 2016 in the VM.

Upvotes: 1

Shannon Lowder
Shannon Lowder

Reputation: 482

Fortunately Always Encrypted is available in Windows Azure SQL Database (WASD), see https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/mt163865.aspx. But to start using it you will first have to either migrate your current environment to SQL 2016 and make the changes to your application to take advantage of the Always Encrypted features, or migrate to Windows Azure SQL Database first, and tackle the Always Encrypted second.

Before moving to WASD, you will want to spin up a development instance, deploy your database schema, and any configuration or lookup data. After you have your development instance, verify your application can use this new instance.

For your sanity, tackle these issues in two steps, not one.

Upvotes: 2

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