Encryption

There are two ways to use moor on encrypted databases. The encrypted_moor package is similar to moor_flutter and uses a platform plugin written in Java. Alternatively, you can use the ffi-based implementation with the sqlcipher_flutter_libs package.

Using encrypted_moor

Starting from 1.7, we have a version of moor that can work with encrypted databases by using the sqflite_sqlcipher library by @davidmartos96. To use it, you need to remove the dependency on moor_flutter from your pubspec.yaml and replace it with this:

dependencies:
  moor: "$latest version"
  encrypted_moor:
   git:
    url: https://github.com/simolus3/moor.git
    path: extras/encryption 

Instead of importing package:moor_flutter/moor_flutter (or package:moor/ffi.dart) in your apps, you would then import both package:moor/moor.dart and package:encrypted_moor/encrypted_moor.dart.

Finally, you can replace FlutterQueryExecutor (or an VmDatabase) with an EncryptedExecutor.

Extra setup on Android and iOS

Some extra steps may have to be taken in your project so that SQLCipher works correctly. For example, the ProGuard configuration on Android for apps built for release.

Read instructions (Usage and installation instructions of the package can be ignored, as that is handled internally by moor)

Encrypted version of moor/ffi

You can also use the new moor/ffi library with an encrypted executor. This allows you to use an encrypted moor database on more platforms, which is particularly interesting for Desktop applications.

Setup

To use sqlcipher, add a dependency on sqlcipher_flutter_libs:

dependencies:
  sqlcipher_flutter_libs: ^0.5.0

If you already have a dependency on sqlite3_flutter_libs, drop that dependency. sqlite3_flutter_libs and sqlcipher_flutter_libs are not compatible as they both provide a (different) set of sqlite3 native apis.

On Android, you also need to adapt the opening behavior of the sqlite3 package to use the encrypted library instead of the regular libsqlite3.so:

import 'package:sqlite3/open.dart';

// call this method before using moor
void setupSqlCipher() {
  open.overrideFor(
      OperatingSystem.android, () => DynamicLibrary.open('libsqlcipher.so'));
}

When using moor on a background database, you need to call setupSqlCipher on the background isolate as well.

On iOS and macOS, no additional setup is necessary - simply depend on sqlcipher_flutter_libs.

On Windows and Linux, you currently have to include a version of SQLCipher manually when you distribute your app. For more information on this, you can use the documentation here. Instead of including sqlite3.dll or libsqlite3.so, you'd include the respective versions of SQLCipher.

Using

SQLCipher implements sqlite3's C api, which means that you can continue to use the sqlite3 package or moor/ffi without changes. They're both fully compatible with sqlcipher_flutter_libs.

To actually encrypt a database, you must set an encryption key before using it. A good place to do that in moor is the setup parameter of VmDatabase, which runs before moor is using the database in any way:

VmDatabase(
  File(...),
  setup: (rawDb) {
    rawDb.execute("PRAGMA key = 'passphrase';");
  }
);