IBM InfoSphere Optim vs. Oracle Data Masking and Subsetting

Optim is especially recommended for those companies that have their own or third-party development teams that must be provided with a complete data environment to test the applications. Optim is not recommended for use as an ETL or Data Integration tool.

Incentivized

The tool is excellent when you need to provide all the details about your clients, yet hide their identity - all while maintaining the referential integrity of the data (so child-records of the masked parent record and maintain the same fake ID of the parent).

Incentivized

• Easily extract data from production environments with no-coding
• Intelligent filtering capabilities using physical or logical relationships.
• Advanced data masking funtions

Incentivized

• It offers several ways in which you can mask your data; for example, you can choose to replace all names with "real fake names", or choose to replace all SSNs with existing SSNs, but randomly assigned. You control the algorithm.
• It works on non-Oracle databases as well (in our case, we use it for both Oracle and SQL/Server).
• The overhead is minimal (it doesn't take long to run, and it doesn't consume too many system resources.

Incentivized

• Poor UI
• Complex architecture

Incentivized

• The learning curve was not trivial - but we got through it.
• Cost - this product is not cheap.

Incentivized

We also looked at Delphix: the tool was quite powerful, easy to use, and competitive from a cost standpoint. However, since our entire data warehouse environment is built on the Oracle technology stack, it made sense to us to use the Oracle product here, as it integrates very well with other Oracle database and ETL products.

Incentivized

• Optim can save companies a lot of money by protecting the sensitive data found in their databases, thus avoiding the theft of real customer information with the economic and media impact that this has.
• Accelerate the generation of non-productive environments saving time from human resources.

Incentivized

• We have many compliance regulations we need to adhere to. Without this tool, we were always taking a risk of exposing client information, and get penalized by the State of the Feds (the financial consequences are significant).
• So while the tool doesn't save us money directly, it greatly reduces the risk we had been taking all these years. To some degree, this is much like an insurance policy.
• Given the above, it also allows us to share information with other departments/agencies, in situations where before we simply couldn't take the risk of exposing client information.

Incentivized