(New encrypt values "mandatory" and "optional", synonymous with "yes" and "no", respectively, have been added to better describe encryption behavior.) With the increased emphasis on secure-by-default, the growing use of cloud databases, and the need to ensure connections are secure, it's time for this backwards-compatibility-breaking change.
Similar to the HTTP to HTTPS default changes made in web browsers a few years back (and the security reasons for them), we are changing the default value of the `Encrypt` connection option from `no` to `yes`/`mandatory`. There a couple breaking changes in 18.0 over previous releases that may affect a lot of users.
Version 18.0 brings several changes, new features, and fixes to the driver. Version 18.0 of the Microsoft ODBC Driver 18 for SQL Server has been released.