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IBM Security Guardium Data Protection vs Trustwave DbProtect 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 ...
Ranking in Database Security
1st
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
8.0
Number of Reviews
77
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Trustwave DbProtect
Ranking in Database Security
4th
Average Rating
8.0
Number of Reviews
6
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Database Security category, the mindshare of IBM Security Guardium Data Protection is 32.0%, up from 31.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Trustwave DbProtect is 4.6%, down from 4.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Database Security
 

Featured Reviews

Ahmer Faisel Khan - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers mature agents, compliance reporting and reliable database security
The solution should allow the data to shift to a centralized repository with elastic servers and big data infrastructure. If a customer searches for old logs for retention purposes, there are limitations on appliances once they are set with specific hardware, so they can only be changed by uninstalling or reinstalling the hardware. The solution's aggregator feature allows data aggregation, but for instance, if a customer wants a project ready in two years, having an Elasticsearch in DB or the capacity to store huge amounts of data would be beneficial in data investigation or evaluation at an affordable cost. Some AI features should be added to IBM Security Guardium Data Protection. For example, the AI features implemented in the solution can be anomaly detection or suspicious activity identification.
Marcelo Raza - PeerSpot reviewer
A tool that offers a proper view and division of all databases while also allowing users to do continuous monitoring
I have seen that the tool's installation phase has some problems regarding the versions, specifically the version of SQL. Trustwave DbProtect doesn't accept some versions of SQL. Some credentials when you are installing give some problems, but all of them did pass through the installation phase but gave a certain amount of hard work to be done during the installation phase. The aforementioned area needs to be considered for improvement. The pain points with Trustwave DbProtect were about the installation and problems with the different versions not being accepted. A more compatible version of the product with other databases and operating systems should be possible.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Compliance Quick Start – Quick, GUI, step-by-step guide to automate compliance and give the customer a quick ROI."
"The purpose of EBM Guardium is to monitor database activity and who is accessing it. This is the most valuable feature."
"Setting up Guardium was easy and straightforward."
"Good data encryption and data masking features."
"It's allowing us to be more proactive than reactive on alerts and access rights and types of resources that are being hit. Before, there were a lot of different solutions, but this expanded that out and made it a more holistic solution. It provides centralization of monitoring, instead of multiple, disparate applications. It definitely allows more economies of scale, streamlining, less fragmented use."
"Our main focus for IBM Guardium is to support security initiatives and compliance policies within our organization. We use the DPD product for monitoring, especially for GDPR, SOX regulations and, of course, the vulnerability assessment that we use to make sure we're keeping up with our patches, making sure things are configured, making sure we're following the best practices."
"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."
"Its ability to find data."
"Transfer and vulnerability scanning are the most valuable features of this product."
"This solution helps our clients to monitor their database use, and detect violations of the policy."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is that you can have a good view which is provided with a proper division of all your databases, which you can see in Trustwave DbProtect."
 

Cons

"We are currently facing a challenge because it does not offer data encryption by default, only data masking."
"There are features like end-to-end and S-TAP mapping, and the ability to install policies for your configuration builder. They're not there, but we'd like to see them in the next version."
"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 ability for Central Managers to talk to one another could be improved. I have 26 Central Managers and 26 silos which are independent."
"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."
"​Overall testing and quality need improvement. It is fairly buggy at times, so it feels like it could use additional staff on the product, testing and trying it out."
"Needs nore cloud support."
"The most important requirements for us are integration with new database solutions and the ability to manage things like Jailbreak or something like that. Its reduction feature can also be improved. It has a functionality called reduction, which is like masking data, but it is just a replacement of characters. Sometimes the customer needs more than this. It would be good if it was more advanced or complete. We also have a problem with this solution because the IBM aggregator isn't working very well. IBM has created big data intelligence for Guardium, and occasionally, customers need three or four months of data, but they can't run it from the collectors. It can have a better dashboard and more pre-defined use cases for those customers who don't have any idea about data protection or don't have expert personnel in this area. For example, they can include five use cases for banks and five use cases for retail."
"I have seen that the tool's installation phase has some problems regarding the versions, specifically the version of SQL."
"The product does not have encryption or data masking."
"We have not been able to integrate this product with a lot of standard incident response solutions, so an open API would help in this regard."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Reasonable cost but could be lower."
"I would suggest to review the type of data, need for security, and if the organizational structure needs the options IBM Guardium provides."
"Guardium's pricing is quite high, but it gives good value for money for all sizes of enterprises, especially for partners."
"Guardium is most suitable for large scale enterprises because the pricing model is better if you are implementing a large number of databases."
"It's an expensive solution"
"Guardium has not saved us time or money."
"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."
"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."
"I rate the pricing a five on a scale from one to ten, where one is the lowest and ten is the highest."
"The licensing fees, including support, are approximately $5,000 USD per database, per year."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
30%
Computer Software Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Insurance Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
19%
Computer Software Company
11%
Government
9%
Healthcare Company
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
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?
The pricing is good, and I have no problem with it. Although there is no flexibility to compete with other products, it generally costs between one hundred and three hundred thousand per year depen...
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.
What do you like most about Trustwave DbProtect?
The most valuable feature of the solution is that you can have a good view which is provided with a proper division of all your databases, which you can see in Trustwave DbProtect.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Trustwave DbProtect?
Price-wise, Trustwave DbProtect falls in the mid-range category in Portugal. Many solutions similar to Trustwave DbProtect are expensive in the market. I rate the pricing a five on a scale from one...
What needs improvement with Trustwave DbProtect?
I have seen that the tool's installation phase has some problems regarding the versions, specifically the version of SQL. Trustwave DbProtect doesn't accept some versions of SQL. Some credentials w...
 

Also Known As

InfoSphere Guardium, Guardium, IBM Guardium
Application Security DbProtect
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
Pax World Investments, Crest Savings Bank, Magnolia Hotels
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Security Guardium Data Protection vs. Trustwave DbProtect and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
844,944 professionals have used our research since 2012.