Securing SQLJ Source Codes from Business Logic Disclosure by Data Hiding Obfuscation

TL;DR

This paper proposes a data hiding obfuscation technique to protect SQLJ source codes from decompilation, aiming to prevent disclosure of confidential business logic and data in distributed applications.

Contribution

It introduces a novel data hiding method to enhance security of SQLJ source codes against decompilation and data disclosure in client-side distributed applications.

Findings

Data hiding effectively prevents decompilation of SQLJ codes.

Enhanced security for confidential business data in distributed applications.

Addresses a gap in data security techniques for client-side applications.

Abstract

Information security is protecting information from unauthorized access, use, disclosure, disruption, modification, perusal and destruction. CAIN model suggest maintaining the Confidentiality, Authenticity, Integrity and Non-repudiation (CAIN) of information. Oracle 8i, 9i and 11g Databases support SQLJ framework allowing embedding of SQL statements in Java Programs and providing programmer friendly means to access the Oracle database. As cloud computing technology is becoming popular, SQLJ is considered as a flexible and user friendly language for developing distributed applications in grid architectures. SQLJ source codes are translated to java byte codes and decompilation is generation of source codes from intermediate byte codes. The intermediate SQLJ application byte codes are open to decompilation, allowing a malicious reader to forcefully decompile it for understanding confidential business logic or data from the codes. To the best of our knowledge, strong and cost effective techniques exist for Oracle Database security, but still data security techniques are lacking for client side applications, giving possibility for revelation of confidential business data. Data obfuscation is hiding the data in codes and we suggest enhancing the data security in SQLJ source codes by data hiding, to mitigate disclosure of confidential business data, especially integers in distributed applications.