Design of secure medical database systems

Abstract

A database design methodology is presented in this paper which aims to improve the security of medical database systems. The proposed methodology is based on both the discretionary and the mandatory database security policies. It also sup­ports tuple-level granularity that helps to reduce the complexity encountered when supporting field-level granularity and minimises the number of fragments encountered when supporting table-level granularity. An experimental implementation of the proposed methodology in a major Greek hospital is also presented. The implementation has proved the usefulness of the proposals as well as their effectiveness in limiting the unauthorised access to the medical database, without severely restricting the capabilities of the system.