partial search on an encrypted field

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David Vergison

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Oct 22, 2019, 10:48:11 AM10/22/19

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Hello,

I would like to know if it is possible to make a partial search (for exemple with the 3 first letters of a lastname) on an encrypted field with mongodb enterprise ?

Thanks !

Kevin Adistambha

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Oct 29, 2019, 1:01:17 AM10/29/19

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Hi David,

I would like to know if it is possible to make a partial search (for exemple with the 3 first letters of a lastname) on an encrypted field with mongodb enterprise ?

No it’s not possible unless you store that first three letters in another field. Any encryption scheme should encrypt the whole field. You cannot have a partially-encrypted field since by definition the field is not encrypted anymore.

Having said that, note that I would personally consider storing the first three letter unencrypted as a security hole since you have a hint of the content of the field.

I’m curious about the use case that requires you to search an encrypted field. Could you elaborate further?