Access 2003 VBA Programmer's Reference

16.1. Access Security Model Overview

With so many methods to set up security in Access, you can easily become overwhelmed deciding which method to choose. This section provides a synopsis of Access security methods, with suggestions for when to use one method over another and when to combine methods. This section also covers the relative difficulty of using these methods.

There are two common scenarios used when setting up Access databases:

• Standalone databases which contain all of the objects necessary to maintain the desired data, including tables, forms, reports, modules, and so on.

• Linked databases in which one database typically contains all user-interface components, such as forms, reports, and modules, with links to tables in another database, which contains all of the tables and data. The database containing the user-interface components and links is called the Front end. The database containing the tables and the data is called the Back end.

There are seven security methods that can be used in Access. You may apply any or all of these security methods to a single database. Additionally, all of the security methods can be applied to a standalone, a front-end, or a back-end database.

• Encoding: Encoding a database encrypts the data in the file such that the data cannot easily be read using a file explorer/browser tool (for example, Windows Notepad). This type of security is useful when the folder that contains the database file can be opened by anyone with access to the system ...