Date: Tue, 14 Aug 2018 15:51:09 -0400
From: Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us>
To: Rui DeSousa <rui@crazybean.net>
Cc: Benedict Holland <benedict.m.holland@gmail.com>,
	Bear Giles <bgiles@coyotesong.com>, Evan Bauer <evanbauer@mac.com>,
	bejita0409@yahoo.co.jp,
	"pgsql-admin@lists.postgresql.org" <pgsql-admin@lists.postgresql.org>,
	"pgsql-general@lists.postgresql.org" <pgsql-general@lists.postgresql.org>
Subject: Re: How to revoke privileged from PostgreSQL's superuser
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On Fri, Aug 10, 2018 at 10:34:26PM -0400, Rui DeSousa wrote:
> With that logic then you should use flat files for encrypted data and
> unencrypted data.  It’s what was done many moons ago; and its unstructured
> haphazard approach gave rise to RDBMS systems.
> 
> You cannot say that encrypted data does not belong in a RDBMS system… that is
> just false.  Hell, I’ve stored blobs in a RDMBS system which could have easily
> been stored in a different system if need be.  It’s a design choice and what
> fits the application and budget needs.
> 
> Encrypting sensitive information and storing in the database is a valid use
> case.  It may be only a few columns that are encrypted or a complete document
> (blob); there is no need to increase complexity just to move those columns out
> of the database.

I think the point is that it makes sense to store data encrypted in a
database only if it is a payload on another piece of non-encrypted data.
You can't easily index, restrict, or join encrypted data, so it doesn't
have a huge value alone in a database.

-- 
  Bruce Momjian  <bruce@momjian.us>        http://momjian.us
  EnterpriseDB                             http://enterprisedb.com

+ As you are, so once was I.  As I am, so you will be. +
+                      Ancient Roman grave inscription +