Let's say I want to develop an expert system, contain lots of knowledge base that I don't want anyone to get the database but from the application. Should I encrypt the data, and only the application know how to encrypt /decrypt (with drawback in performance)?

This is not an issue for web based, since the database is centralized in the server. But for desktop application that I distribute with the database, the data could be read.

Thank you for the feedback.

--- In firebird-support@yahoogroups.com, "Mark Rotteveel" <Avalanche1979@...> wrote:
>
> Such problems are unsolvable for any database system: as long as a customer has access to the database-file, and/or is able to create a backup, they will be able to access the database with full access (it may take some work, but still). This applies to all existing RDBMS.
>
> But more interesting is: Why do you want to limit access to the database?
>
> Mark
>
> > Dear Helen,
> >
> > I really want to know, how to secure a firebird database from being opened
> > by any user but from the application it self. If I distribute a desktop
> > application with a single file Firebird database (not embedded), how to
> > protect the database from being copied to another machine running Firebird with
> > known sysdba password?
> >
> > I have searched the question related with this subject, and only find
> > this:
> > http://stackoverflow.com/questions/685420/finding-a-legacy-firebird-interbase-database-password and also your posting here.
> >
> > If the answer in that post was true, how to use desktop application with
> > firebird database and forbid any user to open it using another machine? Or
> > should I use other database like mySQL or PostgreSQL since it is currently
> > not possible in Firebird?
>
> --
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>