Oracle Acquires British Database Security Firm

Oracle's Vice President of Database Security, Vipin Samar published an open letter on Oracle's site yesterday, May 20 2010, announcing the company's intention of buying database security firm Secerno.

Started after a research project at Oxford University's Computing Laboratory, the company offers database security systems to companies across the world using Oracle, Microsoft's SQL Server and Sybase ASE storage products.

Mainly known for their database firewall application called DataWall, the British company also developed Synoptiq, an engine which monitors database requests in real-time, establishing usage patterns and preventing possible attacks coming from connections with outside the pattern behavior. Syneptiq was at the base of DataWall and is considered one of the best security engines around.

The acquisition is expected to be approved and finalized until the end of June 2010, no final price tag being made available in the open letter or associated press releases. Until the deal closes, each company will continue to function independently, Oracle making a pledge to honor Secerno partner contracts beyond the acquisition and until further notice.

Oracle intends to incorporate Secerno's security tools into their own portfolio in an attempt to have the bigger voice on the database security market, already crowded with Imperva and IBM's Guardium.

Interest has been growing toward this section of the database market since many Governments and regulators announced fines for any hack or data breach in corporate databases. Since then, companies have been looking around for better protection not only to avoid the fines, but keep their clients' data safer from any attack.

Secerno's products have a well-placed role in Oracle's security portfolio, acting as the first line of defense in any database attack or SQL injection. Consult the attached image for more detailed and graphical information.

A presentation of the acquisition can be viewed here courtesy of the Oracle Press Department.

More details about the acquisition can also be found at this link (including press releases, open letters to customers and partners).