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IBM Security Guardium Data Protection vs Oracle Advanced Security comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

IBM Security Guardium Data ...
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
80
Ranking in other categories
Database Security (1st)
Oracle Advanced Security
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.8
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
Endpoint Encryption (12th), Data Masking (10th)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Database Development and Management Tools solutions, they serve different purposes. IBM Security Guardium Data Protection is designed for Database Security and holds a mindshare of 28.0%, down 32.8% compared to last year.
Oracle Advanced Security, on the other hand, focuses on Endpoint Encryption, holds 2.8% mindshare, up 1.4% since last year.
Database Security Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
IBM Security Guardium Data Protection28.0%
Imperva Data Security Fabric26.7%
Oracle Audit Vault10.8%
Other34.5%
Database Security
Endpoint Encryption Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Oracle Advanced Security2.8%
Microsoft BitLocker20.1%
ESET Endpoint Encryption9.8%
Other67.3%
Endpoint Encryption
 

Featured Reviews

DP
Chief Executive Officer at Kipustec
Ensures data security and compliance with reliable alerts and protections
The manuals should be clearer. There needs to be an online course or tutorial for faster management training. The maintenance was slightly complicated. I had to read the manuals carefully and even failed the Guardium certification exam due to insufficient information or time. Improving the tool learning process would be beneficial.
reviewer1458726 - PeerSpot reviewer
Manager at a manufacturing company with 5,001-10,000 employees
Good support, stable, and offers encryption at both the column and table level
The most valuable feature is the data encryption option for columns and tables. We are also getting the benefit of detection data. If I want to share data with another Oracle user then the data sharing is automatically detected. We don't need to modify anything. This is a complete security solution and all of the features that we are using are available off the shelf.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"Guardium does a great job of capturing data and having the ability of trying to pull it out and make sense of it. Using it for business applications is its biggest capability."
"From the perspective of analysis and prevention, this product is pretty accurate."
"Its ability to find data."
"It protects sensitive data and blocks unauthorized access to the data."
"The possible number of databases and database servers which can be monitored by Guardium is high. For me, this is a differentiator of IBM."
"The solution has definitely saved us time, because if you want to monitor this kind of vast environment of different products, it's going to take a lot of time. Let's say one database server has 100 database instances running on it; I don't need to install 100 data instances, I just need to install on the one database server and that will cover all of my instances on that particular database."
"Database logging and audit functions are the most valuable features."
"The platform provides data protection from internal and external threats."
"The most valuable feature is the data encryption option for columns and tables."
"The features that are the most used by the customers and partners are, at the moment, for GDPR, so obviously data encryption and data reduction. Our customers also like the partitioning option."
 

Cons

"I would like to see a lot of additional reporting and analytics features. They have basic outlier detection, but I would love to see that go further, and model it after analytics tools like Splunk."
"Since we are resellers we do not have enough information about the technical aspects and the areas of improvement. However, one consistent report that we receive from our customers is that IBM does not offer timely support due to the size of the organisation. It would be great if they could improve their response time."
"The integration part of the present solution is very complex and tedious. Plus it gives a lot of false positives which need to be eradicated over time."
"The solution could be improved for NoSQL databases."
"I would like to see IBM Guardium have other encryption algorithms employed."
"An area for improvement would be the user interface - currently, it takes around two to three months to become comfortable using it."
"The solution should allow the data to shift to a centralized repository with elastic servers and big data infrastructure"
"The main issue I have with IBM Security Guardium Data Protection is the support. It's not good."
"It is really constrained as an environment because you cannot change something that would be useful. It is a very good product because it is very similar to what you have on-premises. Yes, it is constrained, but it is expected because it is a platform as a service so it has to be constrained."
"Having a single command to encrypt a table would be an improvement."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We haven't talked much about pricing and licencing. But it is not cheap for sure"
"The price of the solution could be better."
"It's an expensive solution"
"Guardium won mostly because of our scope and scale. It was able to perform at the scale that we wanted to use it. ​"
"Its cost is good. With the new metric of licensing, such as PDO not being available now, customers are expecting a good price for the solution."
"The cost depends on the number of databases. You can purchase advanced licenses, but the standard license is calculated based on the number of databases you have to onboard."
"For IBM Guardium, licensing is very simple and straightforward. There are no issues I can speak of."
"My company purchased IBM Guardium Data Protection in a package, so I'm unable to give its exact licensing cost, but for the package of three IBM solutions, it wasn't very expensive. I'd rate the pricing for all three solutions three out of five. When my team deployed IBM Guardium Data Protection, all features were included."
Information not available
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
24%
Computer Software Company
7%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Insurance Company
5%
Financial Services Firm
21%
Insurance Company
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Energy/Utilities Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business28
Midsize Enterprise17
Large Enterprise44
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

How does IBM Guardium Data Protection compare with Imperva SecureSphere Database Security?
IBM Security Guardium Data Protection is a solution for database security from IBM that gives complete visibility, control, and analysis to secure sensitive data and comply with regulations. IBM S...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Guardium Data Protection?
I don't remember the exact prices, but Guardium is an expensive tool because it is targeted towards corporate enterprises.
What do you like most about IBM Security Guardium Data Protection?
The features I like are the robust policies, which allow us to create customized monitoring based on specific activities.
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Also Known As

InfoSphere Guardium, Guardium, IBM Guardium
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
IBVI, illycaffe, Scottish water, trueblue, AirAsia
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM, Imperva, Oracle and others in Database Security. Updated: February 2026.
884,122 professionals have used our research since 2012.