Many applications rely on databases to store data. Some of these data may be very sensitive in nature, e.g. password hashes, email addresses, financial information, tax information, etc. Attackers often exploit security vulnerabilities to steal sensitive information from a database or edit, update or delete data in a database in an unauthorized way. So, it is crucial to secure a database.

There are three major types of security threats that can make a database server vulnerable to cyberattacks. They are:

• Protocol Issues
• Arbitrary Code Execution
• Privilege Escalation

Let’s discuss each of them in detail.

1. Protocol Issues

There may be vulnerabilities in the protocols used by a database. For example, we use various network protocols to communicate with a database. So, if there are vulnerabilities in any of those network protocols, attackers may easily exploit those to steal sensitive data from a database. So, it is very important to use only secure network protocols to communicate with a database.

A database also uses various software. If the software version is old, then it is very likely that the software may have known vulnerabilities. So, it is crucial to use the most updated stable version of software for a database and update the software regularly. More updated a software program is, lesser are its known security vulnerabilities. And, attackers often use these known security vulnerabilities to perpetrate cyberattacks.

Sometimes, attackers may use unknown vulnerabilities to steal sensitive data from a database. So, it is good to mitigate those threats by limiting the access to the database. One should limit who can access the database over network and what actions an …