Database Masking
What is Data Masking?
Data masking is the process of protecting sensitive information in non-production databases from inappropriate visibility. After sanitization, the database remains perfectly usable - the look-and-feel is preserved - but the information content is secure.
Data Masker provides a simple, repeatable and “push-button” method of scrambling data in test systems.
What Does Data Masker Do?
In one easy to use package it provides all the tools needed to substitute, scramble or otherwise obfuscate your test data. If you would like an introduction to the art of data masking have a look at the Data Sanitization Techniques and Data Scrambling Issues white papers.
Why Do You Want Data Masker?
Masked data is a sensible precaution from a business security standpoint and in many cases it is a legal obligation. Its not just a matter of trusting your employees - scrambled test information can help prevent accidental data escapes as well.
How Does Data Masker Do What It Does?
Simple and understandable rules are defined to operate on the data. The collection of these rules perform a series of known, tested and repeatable actions at the push of a button.
Each version of Data Masker has been custom written for the architecture of the target database and it operates only on that database. Data Masker is definitely not generic one-product-for-all-databases software. The database specific design makes Data Masker simple to use on very complex data and lightning fast on large tables.
Take the whirlwind data scrambling tour - it’s quick, only 8 screen shots.
Is My Data Too Complex to be Masked?
Not likely. Data Masker handles even the most intricate data structures. It can preserve data relationships between rows in tables, between rows in the same table or even internally between columns in the same row. These sort of data synchronization issues can be automatically handled by the addition of simple, easily configured masking rules. Don’t worry about the size of the data either - Data Masker has successfully masked tables containing over 110 million rows.
What Platforms and Databases does Data Masker Support?
Oracle and SQL Server. The Data Masker software is installed on a Windows PC and operates on both local and remote databases. For the Oracle version, there are no server side components and all Oracle server versions and operating systems are supported. The SQL Server version uses a small DLL in the instance Binn directory and supports SQL Server versions 7, 2000 and 2005 on every platform on which those databases run.
Note:A MySQL version of Data Masker is currently under development. If you would like to be notified when it is released, please contact us.
Can I Try the Data Masker Out?
Of course. A complete and fully functional copy of the Data Masker software is available for evaluation purposes - just follow this link:
Can I Ask a Question?
Got a challenging problem or just want to know where to start? Send an email to sales@cool-tools.co.uk. We have scrambled a lot of test data and we are happy to provide advice.