Overview of the mask rules

Overview

The mask rule generates values using input sources.

• In an update, the rules replaces existing column values
• In a create, the rules populate new rows of values

ANO Structure

...
task <task-name> {

    <update-or-create> <table> <task-name?>
        mask <column-name> <rule-name?>     // ´?´ means optional
            format <format>
            transform? <transformation?>
            unique?
            <input-sources>
                convert? <conversion?>
                map? <mapping-file?> <mapping-rule?>
}
...

Explained

• The mask keyword is followed by the column that is being anonymized by the rule
• format describes the output of the mask rule
• transform refers to a java transformation function in the DBmasker project that will transform the output of the mask rule before storing back to database
• unique will make the rule respect the unique constraint of the table column
• input-sources define where input where the values are sourced from
• convert refers to a java conversion function in the DBmasker project that will take the input source values as inputs before passing it to the rule
• map refers to a mapping file that may be used as an input, output or input-output of the rule

Mask Input Sources

random-[type]

random-[type]

The random-[type] input source is used to insert a value drawn from a random sequence as defined by the <from> and <to> properties. The random-[type] is one of

• random-integer
• random-decimal
• random-time
• random-date
• random-datetime

File

file

The file input source is used to insert a string value taken from the file defined in the location string. It picks a line from the file sequentially or randomly depending on the random-order property. A conversion class can be selected to manipulate the string selected from the text file. See convert.

Column

column

The column input source is used to insert the specified column value into the masked column. You can only specify a column from the same table. If a column being anonymized is not a string, you can use one of the conversions defined to convert the data type. See convert.

Sequence

sequence

The sequence input source is used to insert a sequence of integers into the column starting with the first INTEGER value and incremented by the second INTEGER value. If -1 is selected, the sequence starts with the highest value stored in the column plus the increment.