Oracle Acquires BlueKai Data Broker for $400 Million, Expands Surveillance Operations

Oracle Corporation acquired BlueKai, one of the world’s largest data brokerage and web tracking companies, on February 24, 2014, for approximately $400 million, significantly expanding Oracle’s commercial surveillance capabilities. The acquisition gave Oracle control of one of the largest repositories of web tracking data outside the federal government, with BlueKai maintaining approximately 700 million actionable consumer profiles by 2015.

BlueKai specialized in using website cookies and tracking technologies to follow users across the internet, monitoring which websites they visit and which emails they open to build comprehensive behavioral profiles. The company’s data brokers operations enabled marketers to infer sensitive information about individuals—including income levels, education, political views, interests, and purchasing behaviors—in order to target them with personalized advertising. BlueKai’s business model centered on buying and selling third-party consumer data, maintaining extensive relationships with data brokers and advertising technology platforms.

Oracle rebranded the acquisition as the Oracle BlueKai Data Management Platform (DMP), integrating it into Oracle’s expanding marketing technology portfolio. Combined with previous acquisitions, Oracle’s total investment in marketing and advertising technology exceeded $3 billion, positioning the company to compete with Adobe and Salesforce in the lucrative digital advertising sector. The BlueKai acquisition provided Oracle with sophisticated tracking infrastructure and extensive consumer surveillance data to complement its existing database and cloud services businesses.

The acquisition significantly expanded Oracle’s surveillance capitalism operations, creating synergies between Oracle’s government intelligence contracts and its commercial data collection activities. The same company holding CIA cloud contracts and Pentagon top-secret clearances now controlled one of the world’s largest commercial tracking and profiling operations, raising questions about potential data flows between commercial and government surveillance systems. Oracle’s dual role as both intelligence contractor and commercial data broker exemplified the convergence of state and corporate surveillance capabilities.

The BlueKai acquisition proved controversial when in June 2020, TechCrunch revealed that a BlueKai database containing billions of records tracking web browsing activity was exposed online, allowing anyone to access sensitive behavioral data on millions of internet users. This data breach—combined with the 2022 class action lawsuit alleging Oracle operated a “worldwide surveillance machine”—demonstrated how Oracle’s $400 million investment in BlueKai enabled mass surveillance operations that collected data on billions of people without meaningful consent, generating revenue by monetizing intimate details of people’s online lives.