Encrypting Views

  Topic last updated -- June 2007

You can obfuscate a view definition. Note that obfuscated views can be reverse engineered because SQL Server must de-obfuscate view definitions for execution. In SQL Server 2000, the obfuscated text is visible in the syscomments system table and may be susceptible to de-obfuscation attempts.

Note   After you obfuscate a view definition, you cannot modify it because the view definition text is obfuscated. If you need to modify an obfuscated view definition, you must delete it and recreate another one.

To obfuscate a view definition

  1. In the SQL Server Enterprise Manager, make sure the Databases node is expanded, and that the node for the target database is expanded, too.

  2. Click the Views node, right-click the target view, then choose Design View from the shortcut menu.

  3. Right-click the background of the Diagram pane and choose Properties from the shortcut menu.

  4. Select Encrypt View and click Close.

See Also

Creating Views