

This provides a separation between those who own the data and those who manage the data, ensuring that a database administrator who is not authorized to view the data cannot access the encrypted data. Always Encrypted relies on the necessary keys to decrypt data to be stored client-side and these keys are never available to the Database Engine. What is Always Encrypted?Īlways Encrypted helps protect sensitive data, such as social security numbers, inside of a database (Azure SQL or SQL Server) by offering column-level encryption.

The reason why it’s not seen at first glance is because the Always Encrypted feature is what provides the column-level security. The question I usually get is “I heard that SQL Server 2016 supports column-level encryption, but I only see row-level”. Which Encryption Options are Available for SQL Server 2016 SP1 Express?Īs shown in the list of security features, you can see that the Express edition supports Row-level security, Always Encrypted, Dynamic data masking, and Auditing (most of which require SP1). This post is motivated by a customer who was hoping to understand a bit more about the different encryption options, specifically column-level encryption, and whether or not the data remains encrypted when exported or backed up. In this post, I want to focus on the Always Encrypted security feature of SQL Server 2016 SP1, specifically with the Express edition. This post is provided by Senior App Dev Manager, Chris Tjoumas who provides an overview of Always Encrypted with SQL Server 2016.
