Destruction of sensitive information

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9600685-B2
Application number	US-201313943574-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Jul 16, 2013
Priority date	Nov 15, 2012
Publication date	Mar 21, 2017
Grant date	Mar 21, 2017

Abstract

Provided are techniques for deleting sensitive information in a database. One or more objects in a database that are accessed by a statement are identified. It is determined that at least one object among the identified one or more objects contains sensitive information by checking an indicator for the at least one object. One or more security policies associated with the at least one object are identified. The identified one or more security policies are implemented for the at least one object to delete sensitive information.

First claim

The invention claimed is:

1. A method, comprising:
providing, using a processor of a computer, a database that includes a database catalog and a database Input/Output (I/O) layer;
providing statements that include a delete secure level clause, wherein the statements comprise a DROP TABLE statement, a DROP INDEX statement, a DROP TABLESPACE statement, an ALTER TABLESPACE statement, and an ADMIN_MOVE_TABLE statement, wherein the statements are executed against the database;
storing a table in the database catalog that includes a secure delete column with an indicator that indicates whether each object in the database has secure information and a security policies column storing locations of security policies for each object in the database;
receiving a statement from the statements that identifies one or more objects in the database to be accessed and that specifies a level of secure deletion from among different levels of secure deletion with the delete secure level clause, wherein the level of secure deletion indicates how to overwrite the secure information;
determining that at least one object among the identified one or more objects contains sensitive information by checking an indicator in the secure delete column of the table in the database catalog for the at least one object, wherein the at least one object that contains sensitive information is stored in one of a raw device, a file container or a portion of a file;
identifying the security policies in the security policies column of the table in the database catalog that are associated with the at least one object and that specify details of a secure deletion procedure;
selecting one or more of the identified security policies based on the level identified in the statement; and
implementing the selected one or more of the identified security policies for the at least one object to delete the sensitive information by invoking, with the database I/O layer, one or more secure delete operations comprising at least one of releasing the raw device, releasing the file container or releasing the portion of the file.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the statement includes the delete secure level clause indicating that secure deletion is to be performed for at least one object accessed by that statement.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the security policies column of the table in the database catalog stores a pointer to the security policies for the at least one object.

4. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
in response to storing the at least one object in the database,
setting the indicator to indicate that the at least one object contains sensitive information; and
storing a location of the security policies to be implemented when deleting that at least one object.

5. The method of claim 4 , wherein each of the security policies provides a default security choice and a permissible range of secure delete choices.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein each of the one or more objects comprises one of a tablespace, a table, and an index.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein a Software as a Service (SaaS) is provided to perform method operations.

Assignees

• IBM

Inventors

• Cherel Thomas
• Milman Ivan M
• Oberhofer Martin
• Padilla Donald A

Classifications

• G06F21/6227 Primary

  where protection concerns the structure of data, e.g. records, types, queries · CPC title