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You may have heard about the recent breach at Air Canada. Because Air Canada recently purchased Aeroplan, it turns out that I have credentials stored in their service. I don't use the app, so I'm not even likely to be part of the subset of users affected. And that's not why I'm posting anything here. Instead, it was a tweet from Ann Cavoukian stating that the breach wouldn't have happened if Air Canada had encrypted all of their customer's data at rest. And maybe I should tweet something about it? But my response is not a short aphorism.
Encryption of data in a case like this is about instituting an additional measure of access control, supplemental to existing controls. But applications are built of components that are in a sense layered (at least conceptually) on top of each other. So where we provide encryption affects what access is protected and how the system overall is affected. This is meant to be a quick tour, so I`m going to make broad, sweeping generalizations. This is based heavily on my own experience.
( Application anatomy 101... )( Encrypt the file system... )
( Encrypt the database... )
( Encrypt individual data elements... )
( Attacking the application... )
( Working with your hands tied... )
I do think that some of the content stored by Air Canada could definitely have been encrypted and protected to a level similar to credit card numbers. Passport numbers and Nexus card numbers, for example. But to encrypt everything? That runs the risk of seriously hampering things. My main point is that encryption isn't magical security dust that protects against everything.
Encryption of data in a case like this is about instituting an additional measure of access control, supplemental to existing controls. But applications are built of components that are in a sense layered (at least conceptually) on top of each other. So where we provide encryption affects what access is protected and how the system overall is affected. This is meant to be a quick tour, so I`m going to make broad, sweeping generalizations. This is based heavily on my own experience.
( Application anatomy 101... )( Encrypt the file system... )
( Encrypt the database... )
( Encrypt individual data elements... )
( Attacking the application... )
( Working with your hands tied... )
I do think that some of the content stored by Air Canada could definitely have been encrypted and protected to a level similar to credit card numbers. Passport numbers and Nexus card numbers, for example. But to encrypt everything? That runs the risk of seriously hampering things. My main point is that encryption isn't magical security dust that protects against everything.
