How to protect a database from the Server Administrator in Sql Server

Question

We have a requirement from a client to protect the database our application uses, even from their local administrators (Auditors just gave them that requirement).

In the

Answer 1

This has been asked a lot in the last few weeks. The answers usually boil down to:

(

a) If you don't control the application you are doomed to trust the DBA

or

b) If you do control the application you can encrypt everything with a key only known to the application, and decrypt on the way out. It'll hurt performance a bit (or a lot) though, that's why TDE exists. A variant of this to prevent tampering is to use a cryptographic hash of the values in the column, checking them upon application access.

)

and

c) Do extensive auditing, so you can control what are your admins doing.