How to encrypt the SQLite database in Flutter?

Question

I am creating a database in Flutter by the following code, is there any way we can encrypt the database?

Is there any library available for Flutter?

initDb() async {
    io.Directory documentsDirectory = await getApplicationDocumentsDirectory();
    String path = join(documentsDirectory.path, "test.db");
    var theDb = await openDatabase(path, version: 1, onCreate: _onCreate);
    return theDb;
  }

Chaos

Answer 1

Pointy Castle seems to be the encryption library of choice at the moment.

Mayfield

Do we have anything exactly like SQLCipher ?? – Chaos

@RajaJawahar Yes. See pub.dartlang.org/packages/flutter_sqlcipher – Spreader

FYI - As of March16, 2020, Pointy Castle is no longer being maintained. – Bivens

@Bivens PointyCastle has been moved here: github.com/bcgit/pc-dart – Hoopoe

What are the advantages of using SQLChieper rather than Pointy Castle? – Charland

Answer 2

Current sqflite uses whatever sqlite version the platform provides. There is a discussion about that here that you could follow here: https://github.com/tekartik/sqflite/issues/32

The only solution I am aware now is this one https://github.com/QwilApp/encrypted_sqlite which can be used as a drop-in replacement to sqflite which as you stated uses SQLCipher on the native side

Arterialize

Hi, @Arterialize You might want to update this answer with your library pub.dev/packages/sembast Thanks! :) – Tidbit

@Tidbit well the question was about encrypting sqlite database, sembast is an alternative but it ain't no sql! – Arterialize

drift with encryption seems worth considering, then you do not have to "worry" bout where to store the key it looks like – Dewyeyed

Answer 3

I am also looking for such a library today.

And finally I found flutter_sqlcipher in pub.dev, which really solved my problem.

Here is the description of it.

This is a Flutter plugin that bundles and wraps SQLCipher for Android, an open-source extension to SQLite that provides transparent 256-bit AES encryption of database files.

Hope it helps you.

Terracotta

Caveat: Android only, at present. (iOS support is planned.) Source – Incommunicable

Caveat: Not compatible with Dart 3 – Arroyo