Non-Human Identities in SQL*Plus
The database waited. Silent. Locked tight behind the authentication rules. You had credentials for your human admins, but the pipeline needed its own identity to run. This is where Non-Human Identities in SQL*Plus come in—service accounts, automated agents, and secure roles built for machines, not people.
Non-Human Identities in SQL*Plus let you connect systems without embedding personal logins into automation scripts, CI/CD pipelines, or scheduled jobs. Instead of storing developer usernames in plain text or sharing one human account across multiple processes, you create a dedicated service identity with a defined scope. That identity can run queries, execute stored procedures, or handle batch processing on its own, with privileges matched to its operational role.
In practice, using Non-Human Identities with SQL*Plus means you define and manage dedicated Oracle database accounts whose passwords, tokens, or certificates are stored securely, often in a secrets manager. You configure SQL*Plus to authenticate via those credentials directly, ensuring separation between human admin access and machine execution. This reduces risk: compromised keys affect only that machine role, not every human user tied to the system.
Security policies for Non-Human Identities should enforce least privilege. Limit the schema access, lock down unnecessary commands, and monitor activity logs. SQL*Plus itself can be paired with audit trails so every connect, run, and disconnect is captured—critical for compliance and incident response. Rotate credentials often and integrate with secure vault tooling so each identity is ephemeral and new each deployment cycle.
When deploying databases at scale, the absence of clear boundaries between human and machine logins leads to brittle security. Embracing Non-Human Identities inside SQL*Plus workflows creates a clean line: humans build automation, machines run it. Each has independent, controllable access, making breaches smaller and systems tighter.
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