AWS RDS DB Instance or Cluster Password Modified

Last updated a month ago on 2025-11-24

Created 2 years ago on 2024-06-27

About

Identifies the modification of the master password for an AWS RDS DB instance or cluster. Changing the master password is a legitimate recovery action when access is lost, but adversaries with sufficient permissions may modify it to regain access, establish persistence, bypass existing controls, or escalate privileges within a compromised environment. Because RDS does not expose the password in API responses, this operation can meaningfully alter access pathways to sensitive data stores.

Tags

Domain: CloudData Source: AWSData Source: Amazon Web ServicesData Source: AWS RDSUse Case: Threat DetectionTactic: PersistenceTactic: Privilege EscalationTactic: Defense EvasionLanguage: eql

Severity

medium

Risk Score

MITRE ATT&CK™

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

↳ Account Manipulation (T1098)(external, opens in a new tab or window)

Privilege Escalation (TA0004)(external, opens in a new tab or window)

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

False Positive Examples

Master password modification may occur during legitimate administrative recovery (e.g., a lost password, rotation event, or Secrets Manager reassociation). Validate whether the change was expected, approved, and performed by authorized personnel. If known workflows routinely perform this action, consider adding targeted exceptions.

License

Elastic License v2(external, opens in a new tab or window)

Definition

Rule Type: Event Correlation Rule
Integration Pack: Prebuilt Security Detection Rules
Index Patterns: filebeat-*logs-aws.cloudtrail-*
Related Integrations: aws(external, opens in a new tab or window)
Query

✄𐘗text code block:
✄𐘗info where event.dataset == "aws.cloudtrail"
    and event.provider == "rds.amazonaws.com"
    and event.action in ("ModifyDBInstance", "ModifyDBCluster")
    and event.outcome == "success"
    and stringContains(aws.cloudtrail.request_parameters, "masterUserPassword=*")

Install detection rules in Elastic Security

Detect AWS RDS DB Instance or Cluster Password Modified 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).