This was tested on Oracle 11.2. You can use a raw column to store binary data:
SQL> create table my_table (raw_column raw(20))
2 /
Table created.
SQL>
If you try to insert character data into it directly, you get an ORA-01465:
SQL> insert into my_table values ('Andrew Reid')
2 /
insert into my_table values ('Andrew Reid')
*
ERROR at line 1:
ORA-01465: invalid hex number
SQL>
You have to convert it to binary first as follows:
SQL> insert into my_table values
2 (utl_raw.cast_to_raw('Andrew Reid'))
3 /
1 row created.
SQL>
Conversely, if you try to read the data, it is displayed in hexadecimal format:
SQL> select * from my_table
2 /
RAW_COLUMN
----------------------------------------
416E647265772052656964
SQL>
… but you can read it like this:
SQL> select utl_raw.cast_to_varchar2(raw_column)
2 from my_table
3 /
UTL_RAW.CAST_TO_VARCHAR2(RAW_COLUMN)
-------------------------------------------------------
Andrew Reid
SQL>
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