ms-triMicrosoft confirmed this morning that it has acquired Aorato, an Israel-based enterprise security firm that works in conjunction with Microsoft’s Active Directory. Financial terms of the deal weren’t disclosed by the companies, but the Wall Street Journal reports that the price was “around $200 million.”

In a post announcing the deal, Microsoft vice president Takeshi Numoto explains the reasons for the acquisition.

Aorato’s sophisticated technology uses machine learning to detect suspicious activity on a company’s network. It understands what normal behavior is and then identifies anomalies, so a company can quickly see suspicious behavior and take appropriate measures to help protect itself. Key to Aorato’s approach is the Organizational Security Graph, a living, continuously-updated view of all of the people and machines accessing an organization’s Windows Server Active Directory (AD). AD is used by most enterprises to store user identities and administer access to critical business applications and systems. Therefore, most of our enterprise customers should be able to easily take advantage of Aorato’s technology. This will complement similar capabilities that we have developed for Azure Active Directory, our cloud-based identity and access management solution.

TechCrunch notes that Aorato, founded by veterans of the Israeli defense forces, had raised a total of $11 million in funding.

In a message on its site, Aorato writes, “Joining Microsoft gives us a unique opportunity to pursue this vision, and help customers at the broadest possible scale.”

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