IBM said yesterday that it had acquired privately held Israeli company Guardium, a market leader in real-time enterprise database monitoring and protection for an undisclosed sum.

Israeli financial newspaper TheMarker had earlier reported the acquisition was worth approximately $225 million.

The acquisition of the Guardium, based in Waltham will enable IBM clients to maintain trusted information infrastructures by continuously monitoring access and activity to protect high-value databases against threats from legitimate users and potential hackers.

It will also help clients streamline compliance processes for ever-changing industry and government mandates with centralised and automated controls for all major platforms.

The Armonk-based Big Blue said that the combination of IBM and Guardium technology would help organisations safely realise the promise of business analytics.

Designed for cross-platform environments, Guardium's technology identifies patterns and anomalies in data access and usage allowing organisations to maintain the integrity of their data and turn it into a strategic business asset.