Efficient database encryption scheme for database-as-a-service environment

Abstract

Computing-as-a-service is gaining ground. Clients may use the service without purchasing the system supporting the service. Database-as-a-Service (DBaaS) is an important area of computing-as-a-service. DBaaS allows clients to use an expensive database management system without purchasing it. In a DBaaS environment, database Tables are stored on servers belonging to a service provider, and hence, they must be encrypted in order to ensure data confidentiality. However, the encryption introduces performance degradation in the execution of queries over encrypted data. The execution of range queries, in particular, undergoes severe performance degradation. Several encryption schemes to alleviate this problem have been proposed. However, most of these schemes leak other information in addition to order information. In this study, a new database encryption scheme for DBaaS is proposed. The proposed scheme enables the execution of range queries without severe performance degradation and without leakage of information other than order information.