Elastic Security Detection Rules

AWS EC2 Network Access Control List Creation

Last updated 19 days ago on 2025-06-05
Created 5 years ago on 2020-06-04

About

Identifies the creation of an AWS EC2 network access control list (ACL) or an entry in a network ACL with a specified rule number. Adversaries may exploit ACLs to establish persistence or exfiltrate data by creating permissive rules.
Tags
Domain: CloudData Source: AWSData Source: Amazon Web ServicesData Source: AWS EC2Use Case: Network Security MonitoringTactic: PersistenceTactic: Defense EvasionLanguage: kuery
Severity
low
Risk Score
21
MITRE ATT&CK™

Persistence (TA0003)(opens in a new tab or window)

↳ External Remote Services (T1133)(opens in a new tab or window)

Defense Evasion (TA0005)(opens in a new tab or window)

↳ Impair Defenses (T1562)(opens in a new tab or window)

False Positive Examples
Network ACL's may be created by a network administrator. Verify whether the user identity should be making changes in your environment. Network ACL creations by unfamiliar users should be investigated. If known behavior is causing false positives, it can be exempted from the rule.
License
Elastic License v2(opens in a new tab or window)

Definition

Rule Type
Query (Kibana Query Language)
Integration Pack
Prebuilt Security Detection Rules
Index Patterns
filebeat-*logs-aws.cloudtrail-*
Related Integrations

aws(opens in a new tab or window)

Query
event.dataset:aws.cloudtrail and event.provider:ec2.amazonaws.com and event.action:(CreateNetworkAcl or CreateNetworkAclEntry) and event.outcome:success

Install detection rules in Elastic Security

Detect AWS EC2 Network Access Control List Creation in the Elastic Security detection engine by installing this rule into your Elastic Stack.

To setup this rule, check out the installation guide for Prebuilt Security Detection Rules(opens in a new tab or window).