Elastic Security Detection Rules

ESXi Virtual Machine Snapshot Removed

Last updated 2 days ago on 2026-09-30
Created 2 days ago on 2026-09-30

About

Detects removal of all snapshots for an ESXi virtual machine. Snapshots are on-host recovery points for a guest. Removing all of them deletes those recovery points, so the virtual machine cannot be reverted to an earlier disk state.
Tags
Domain: EndpointData Source: VMware vSphereUse Case: Threat DetectionTactic: ImpactRule Type: Custom Query (KQL)Platform: VMware ESXiThreat: RansomwareLanguage: kuery
Severity
high
Risk Score
73
MITRE ATT&CK™

Impact (TA0040)(external, opens in a new tab or window)

↳ Inhibit System Recovery (T1490)(external, opens in a new tab or window)

False Positive Examples
Snapshot consolidation after backups, storage pressure, and planned decommissioning can remove every snapshot for a VM. Confirm the account and whether the command ran against one VM or every VM.
License
Elastic License v2(external, opens in a new tab or window)

Definition

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

vsphere(external, opens in a new tab or window)

Query
text code block:
data_stream.dataset: "vsphere.log" and (
  message: "snapshot.removeall"
)

Install detection rules in Elastic Security

Detect ESXi Virtual Machine Snapshot Removed 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(external, opens in a new tab or window).