Advanced security and compliance

Advanced security and compliance abilities are available in Azure SQL Managed Instance to help protect your data and comply to legal requirements. Amongst the main features are as follows:

1. Data Encryption: By default, data in transit and at rest is protected using Azure SQL Managed Instance. While data in transit is encrypted using SSL/TLS, Transparent Data Encryption (TDE) encrypts data files, backups, and transaction log files.
2. Dynamic Data Masking: This function guarantees that only authorized users may view every bit of data, helping to prevent unwanted access to important data by immediately masking it.
3. Row-Level Security (RLS): RLS provides fine-grained access control over data through allowing you to restrict access to rows in a database table based on the characteristics of the user performing a query.
4. Always Encrypted: The Always Encrypted function ensures that confidential data, like credit card numbers as well as personally identifiable information (PII), stays encrypted even when accessed by privileged users or database administrators.
5. Azure Active Directory Integration: Managed Instance provides centralized identity management and access control for your databases through integration with Azure Active Directory (Azure AD) for authentication and authorization.
6. Advanced Threat Protection (ATP): By continuously monitoring database activities, determining patterns, and alerting administrators about questionable behavior, ATP helps in the real-time detection and response to potential threats.
7. Vulnerability Assessment: For SQL databases, Azure Security Center provides comprehensive vulnerability assessment instruments that help with locating and fixing possible security vulnerabilities and set up errors.
8. Auditing and Compliance: You can track and monitor the operation of databases, access attempts, and configuration changes using Managed Instance’s auditing characteristics. In addition, it aids in proving that you adhere to regulations including GDPR, HIPAA, and PCI DSS.
9. Data Classification: Sensitive data can be more effectively determined, tracked, and safeguarded if it is divided according to its impact on the business and its degree of sensitivity.
10. Regulatory Compliance: Azure SQL Managed Instance provides a secure and compliant platform for your apps and data by adhering to a variety of industry-specific and regional demands, including GDPR, HIPAA, SOC 1/2/3, ISO 27001, and PCI DSS.

We will get an overview of Azure SQL Managed Instance. Managed instances combine leading security features with SQL Server compatibility and a business model designed for on-premises developers and clients. There are many reasons that developers want to migrate to Azure SQL Managed Instance. The main one is, that they want to migrate to Azure, and they want to remove some of that management overhead and stress with regards to some of the PaaS capabilities. But they might have restrictions. Maybe they need instance-scoped features. 

When we talk about instance-scoped features, we really mean features that are scoped to the server as opposed to the database, and this includes things like Service Broker, SQL Server Agent, CLR, machine learning services, etc. These are just a few of the reasons why developers move towards Azure SQL Managed Instance.