Preventing unauthorized access

From: /dev/null (anonymous_at_discussions.microsoft.com)
Date: 02/24/04 

Date: Tue, 24 Feb 2004 10:21:09 -0800

I am building a windows forms VB .NET project that connects to an SQL server database. The problem we have is that since we are using windows-based authentication, anyone with access or even excel can connect to the sql server and fiddle with the data. I looked into application roles but using this we lose flexibility for giving (or removing) rights from specific users.

This problem wouldn't exist if we were building web apps, as we could set things up in a way the web server would be the only one to connect to the database.

What do people use in enterprises to prevent users from connecting to databases with unauthorized apps ?

Thanks in advance.