Row level security integration of analytical data store with cloud architecture

• US 9,600,548 B2
• Filed: 10/10/2014
• Issued: 03/21/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 10/10/2014
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Salesforce.com, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Salesforce.com, Inc.
• Inventors: Schneider, Donovan A., Silver, Daniel C., Im, Fred, Chakravarthy, Vijayasarathy
• Primary Examiner(s): Zecher, Dede
• Assistant Examiner(s): MCCOY, RICHARD ANTHONY
• Application Number:
  US14/512,230
• Publication Number:
  US 20160104002A1
• Time in Patent Office: 893 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/1865 Transactional file systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/254 Extract, transform and load [ETL] procedures, e.g. ETL data flows in data warehouses
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/6227 where protection concerns the structure of data, e.g. records, types, queries
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/08 for authentication of entities cryptographic mechanisms or cryptographic arrangements for entity authentication H04L9/32
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/102 Entity profiles

Abstract

A predicate-based row level security system is used when workers build or split an analytical data store. According to one implementation, predicate-based means that security requirements of source transactional systems can be used as predicates to a rule base that generates one or more security tokens, which are associated with each row as attributes of a dimension. Similarly, when an analytic data store is to be split, build job, user and session attributes can be used to generate complementary security tokens that are compared to security tokens of selected rows. Efficient indexing of a security tokens dimension makes it efficient to qualify row retrieval based on security criteria.

Claims

1. A method of building a secure read-only analytic data structure, the method including:

accessing a data set from at least one transactional data management system, wherein data in the data set has security attributes managed by the at least one transactional data management system;

processing first security translation rules that accept the security attributes as predicates and generating one or more security tokens for each object in the data set; and

storing the one or more security tokens by association with each secured object in the read-only analytic data structure generated from the data set, wherein the stored one or more security tokens govern access to each secured object.

2. The method of claim 1, further including:

accessing a plurality of heterogeneous transactional data management systems that have divergent security models;

accessing data in the plurality of heterogeneous transactional data management systems and creating objects that merge the accessed data from two or more heterogeneous transactional data management systems of the plurality of heterogeneous transactional data management systems; and

processing first security translation rules that accept the security attributes from the two or more heterogeneous transactional data management systems of the plurality of heterogeneous transactional data management systems as predicates and generating one or more security tokens to associate with each secured object that merges the accessed data.

3. The method of claim 1, further including:

accessing a data set from at least one transactional data management system, wherein data in the data set lacks a security model;

accessing the data set and creating a new read-only analytic data structure that merges the data lacking the security model with the read-only analytic data structure; and

associating the one or more security tokens associated with the read-only analytic data structure to the new read-only analytic data structure.

4. The method of claim 1, further including:

receiving an authenticated and authorized command to build an analytic sub-structure from the read-only analytic data structure that satisfies a subset query;

applying second security translation rules to construct at least one query security token based on the authenticated and authorized command, wherein the at least one query security token qualifies the command to access one or more secured objects in the read-only analytic data structure; and

supplying the subset query and the at least one query security token to a query engine and receiving the one or more secured objects from the read-only analytic data structure that satisfy the subset query and that have an associated security token that matches the at least one query security token.

5. The method of claim 4, further including mobilizing the analytic sub-structure from a secure server based platform to a browser based user client platform, the mobilizing of the analytic sub-structure including:

receiving a subset query to receive a subset of data in the analytic sub-structure; and

supplying the subset of data to the browser based user client platform that satisfies the subset query with a reduced bandwidth and processing time.

6. The method of claim 1, further including:

receiving an authenticated and authorized command to receive a subset of data in the read-only analytic data structure that satisfies a subset query;

applying second security translation rules to construct at least one query security token based on the authenticated and authorized command, wherein the at least one query security token qualifies the command to access the subset of data in the read-only analytic data structure; and

supplying the subset query and the at least one query security token to a query engine and receiving the subset of data from the read-only analytic data structure that satisfies the subset query and that has an associated security token that matches the at least one query security token.

7. The method of claim 6, further including mobilizing the subset of data from a secure server based platform to a browser based user client platform, the mobilizing of the subset of data including:

receiving a subset query to receive the subset of data; and

supplying the subset of data to the browser based user client platform that satisfies the subset query with a reduced bandwidth and processing time.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the security attributes are based on one or more security models used to manage access to the at least one transactional data management system.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein the one or more security models include at least one of:

row-based security;

LDAP-based security;

agent-based security;

team-based security;

account-hierarchy-based security;

group-based security; and

sharing-descriptor-based security.

10. The method of claim 1, further including generating a view-all-data initial instance of the read-only analytic data structure before the processing of the first security translation rules.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein the one or more security tokens define accessibility of respective dimensions and measures of each secured object.

12. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium impressed with computer program instructions for building a secure read-only analytic data structure, the instructions, when executed on a hardware processor implement a method comprising:

accessing a data set from at least one transactional data management system, wherein data in the data set has security attributes managed by the at least one transactional data management system;

processing first security translation rules that accept the security attributes as predicates and generating one or more security tokens for each object in the data set; and

storing the one or more security tokens by association with each secured object in the read-only analytic data structure generated from the data set, wherein the stored one or more security tokens govern access to each secured object.

13. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 12, wherein the method further comprises:

accessing a plurality of heterogeneous transactional data management systems that have divergent security models;

accessing data in the plurality of heterogeneous transactional data management systems and creating objects that merge the accessed data from two or more heterogeneous transactional data management systems of the plurality of heterogeneous transactional data management systems; and

process first security translation rules that accept the security attributes from the two or more heterogeneous transactional data management systems of the plurality of heterogeneous transactional data management systems as predicates and generating one or more security tokens to associate with each secured object that merges the accessed data.

14. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 12, wherein the method further comprises:

accessing a data set from at least one transactional data management system, wherein data in the data set lacks a security model;

accessing the data set and creating a new read-only analytic data structure that merges the data lacking the security model with the read-only analytic data structure; and

associating the one or more security tokens associated with the read-only analytic data structure to the new read-only analytic data structure.

15. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 12, wherein the method further comprises:

receiving an authenticated and authorized command to build an analytic sub-structure from the read-only analytic data structure that satisfies a subset query;

applying second security translation rules to construct at least one query security token based on the authenticated and authorized command, wherein the at least one query security token qualifies the command to access one or more secured objects in the read-only analytic data structure; and

supplying the subset query and the at least one query security token to a query engine and receiving the one or more secured objects from the read-only analytic data structure that satisfy the subset query and that have an associated security token that matches the at least one query security token.

16. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 15, wherein the method further comprises mobilizing the analytic sub-structure from a secure server based platform to a browser based user client platform, the mobilizing of the analytic sub-structure including:

receiving a subset query to receive a subset of data in the analytic sub-structure; and

supplying the subset of data to the browser based user client platform that satisfies the subset query with a reduced bandwidth and processing time.

17. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 12, wherein the method further comprises:

receiving an authenticated and authorized command to receive a subset of data in the read-only analytic data structure that satisfies a subset query;

applying second security translation rules to construct at least one query security token based on the authenticated and authorized command, wherein the at least one query security token qualifies the command to access the subset of data in the read-only analytic data structure; and

supplying the subset query and the at least one query security token to a query engine and receiving the subset of data from the read-only analytic data structure that satisfies the subset query and that has an associated security token that matches the at least one query security token.

18. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 17, wherein the method further comprises mobilizing the subset of data from a secure server based platform to a browser based user client platform, the mobilizing of the subset of data including:

receiving a subset query to receive the subset of data; and

supplying the subset of data to the browser based user client platform that satisfies the subset query with a reduced bandwidth and processing time.

19. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 12, wherein the security attributes are based on one or more security models used to manage access to the at least one transactional data management system.

20. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 19, wherein the one or more security models include at least one of:

row-based security;

LDAP-based security;

agent-based security;

team-based security;

account-hierarchy-based security;

group-based security; and

sharing-descriptor-based security.

21. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 12, wherein the method further comprises generating a view-all-data initial instance of the read-only analytic data structure before the processing of the first security translation rules.

22. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 12, wherein the one or more security tokens define accessibility of respective dimensions and measures of each secured object.

23. An apparatus for building a secure read-only analytic data structure, the apparatus comprising:

a memory storing computer instructions; and

a processor configured to execute the stored computer instructions to;

access a data set from at least one transactional data management system, wherein data in the data set has security attributes managed by the at least one transactional data management system;

process first security translation rules that accept the security attributes as predicates and generating one or more security tokens for each object in the data set; and

store the one or more security tokens by association with each secured object in the read-only analytic data structure generated from the data set, wherein the stored one or more security tokens govern access to each secured object.