ORA-39181:Only Partial Table Data Exported Due To Fine Grain Access Control

Applies to:

Oracle Server - Enterprise Edition - Version 10.2.0.1 and later
Information in this document applies to any platform.
***Checked for relevance on 20-SEP-2012*** 

Symptoms

ERROR:
ORA-39181 :only partial table data may be exported due to fine grain access control

This error appears trying to datapump export a table with FGAC policy enabled against it.

When Expdp runs as the schema owner, if fine grained policies are discovered on tables and if the exporting  user has unrestricted access, then the entire table data is exported.
 
  

Changes

A table with FGAC policy enabled against it.

Scenario 1 (unprivileged user)
------------------------------
table: ABC_TAB
partition=yes
table_owner= X_USER
data= 500GB

when expdp X_USER/password parameter=exp_ABC_TAB.par
==>
Getting ORA-39181: Only partial table data may be exported due to fine grain access control


Scenario 2 (privileged user)
-----------------------------
table: ABC_TAB
partition=yes
table_owner= X_USER

when expdp oradba/password parameter=exp_ABC_TAB.par
==>
Getting exported "X_USER"."ABC_TAB":"ABC_TAB_AA"12340 KB   1000 rows
Master table "ORADBA"."ABC_TAB_AA" successfully loaded/unloaded

Cause

This is expected behavior.

ORA-39181 is caused by an unprivileged user who tries to export a table with a fine grain access control policiy applied. The table owner is subject to access control and may not be able to export all rows in the table. Only the rows that can be seen by that user are exported. In order to preserve integrity of the table, the user importing the table should have enough privilege to recreate the table with the security policies at import time.

Action: It is strongly recommended that the database administrator handles the export of this table.

This as an informational message.

VPD and Oracle Label Security are not enforced during DIRECT path export and similarly, database users granted the EXEMPT ACCESS POLICY privilege, either directly or through a database role, are exempt from VPD enforcements. However, the following policy enforcement options remain in effect even when EXEMPT ACCESS POLICY is granted:

* INSERT_CONTROL, UPDATE_CONTROL, DELETE_CONTROL, WRITE_CONTROL, LABEL_UPDATE, and LABEL_DEFAULT

EXEMPT ACCESS POLICY  is a strong privilege and must be granted with care. For example , grant it to the role exp_full_database role as this role is granted to admin users only.

Solution

To avoid this:

 Grant the privilege EXEMPT ACCESS POLICY to the exporting user

 -or-

 Disable the VPD policy.