Re: "Sensitive data"

From: Russell Fields (rlfields_at_sprynet.com)
Date: 08/26/03 

Date: Tue, 26 Aug 2003 10:36:53 -0400

bill,

I have found scrambling more 'useful', but more work. I believe that there
is a company on the web somewhere (I found it once, but lost it again) who
offers a program for it.

However, we have done it ourselves when we needed it. Lightly scrambling for
general testing, 'heavy' scrambling for opening up normally confidential
information to a broader audience, etc.

TSQL Solutions had an article in its paper days that made a first pass at
doing this, but it did not address the complexities of people data, SSN,
etc.

Russell Fields
"bill salkin" <wsalkin@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:07c101c36b56$b22e15b0$a101280a@phx.gbl...
> It is a common (but bad) practice to take a dump of a
> production database, then restore it on a box for
> developer's to access (for testing, bug fixes, etc.)
>
> Some of the data could contain SSN, Driver's numbers,
> Names, etc and personal info that shouldn't be readily
> available to developers.(via ODBC, OLEDB, etc)
>
> Here are the choices I see:
>
> 1. generate test data for developer's to use.
>
> 2. Scramble "sensitive" fields so they contain gibberish
> text
>
> Either approach requires a bit of work.
>
> How have you met this type of challenge?
>
> TIA,
> Bill