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Against Feature Restrictions

Solomon Rutzky is not a fan of Feature Restrictions in SQL Server 2019 CTP 3.2:

However, nobody’s perfect and occasionally the SQL Server team makes a mistake. A new feature introduced in SQL Server 2019 CTP 3.2, “Feature Restrictions”, is an unfortunate example of such a mistake. It’s a tragically misguided attempt at improving security that not only increases the chances of SQL Injection, but it also prevented useful changes from being made. “Misguided” because it doesn’t even accomplish it’s stated goal, and “tragic” because it a) most likely increases the chances of SQL Injection, and b) used up the time that could have been spent on implementing useful changes.

Read on to see why. Some of it is the travails of blacklisting (for example, the product blacklists WAITFOR but there’s more than one way to force a wait), some is offsetting behavior (as you introduce risk-reducing products, people compensate by taking additional risks up to the point of the prior equilibrium), and some of it is additional information leakage.