"Organizations require a comprehensive security solution which includes database firewall functionality to prevent sophisticated attacks from reaching databases", Oracle said in a statement.

Financial terms of the deal were undisclosed, but the acquisition is expected to close before the end of June.

Analysts said the deal will put Oracle in a stronger position to compete against IBM, which made a similar acquisition in December when it bought Guardium.

"The Secerno acquisition is in direct response to increasing customer challenges around mitigating database security risk", said Andrew Mendelsohn, senior vice-president, Oracle Database Server Technologies.

"Secerno's database firewall product acts as a first line of defence against external threats and unauthorized internal access, with a protective perimeter around Oracle and non-Oracle databases", he said.

This story was first published by Computer Weekly