If you exceed the value of parameter  “FAILED_LOGIN_ATTEMPTS” when trying to logon ORACLE database with wrong password then your oracle account will be locked and you will get the “ORA-28000:the account is locked” message..

From Oracle 10.2 , this parameter’s default value is 10

We can check this value easly via SQLPlus with following syntax ;

SQL> show parameter FAILED_LOGIN_ATTEMPTS

NAME TYPE VALUE
———————————— ———– ——————————
sec_max_failed_login_attempts integer 10

If you going to set this parameter value to UNLIMITED , then your oracle account will not lock again.

You can do this with following sql syntax but don’t forget security risk before doing this change

ALTER PROFILE DEFAULT LIMIT FAILED_LOGIN_ATTEMPTS UNLIMITED;

Also i would like to share this sql snytax if you want to unlock any locked account

ALTER USER <account name> ACCOUNT UNLOCK;