Elastic Security Detection Rules

AWS S3 Bucket Expiration Lifecycle Configuration Added

Last updated 21 days ago on 2025-10-24
Created 2 years ago on 2024-04-12

About

Identifies the addition of an expiration lifecycle configuration to an Amazon S3 bucket. S3 lifecycle rules can automatically delete or transition objects after a defined period. Adversaries can abuse them by configuring auto-deletion of logs, forensic evidence, or sensitive objects to cover their tracks. This rule detects the use of the PutBucketLifecycle or PutBucketLifecycleConfiguration APIs with Expiration parameters, which may indicate an attempt to automate the removal of data to hinder investigation or maintain operational secrecy after malicious activity.
Tags
Domain: CloudData Source: AWSData Source: Amazon Web ServicesData Source: Amazon S3Use Case: Asset VisibilityTactic: Defense EvasionLanguage: eql
Severity
low
Risk Score
21
MITRE ATT&CK™

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

↳ Indicator Removal (T1070)(opens in a new tab or window)

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

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

↳ Data Destruction (T1485)(opens in a new tab or window)

False Positive Examples
Legitimate administrators may add lifecycle expiration configurations to reduce storage costs or enforce retention policies. Confirm whether this change aligns with an approved data management policy or infrastructure-as-code workflow. Known lifecycle automation processes (e.g., cost-management tools, data-lifecycle governance jobs) can be safely excluded from alerting once verified.
License
Elastic License v2(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(opens in a new tab or window)

Query
info where event.dataset == "aws.cloudtrail"
   and event.action == "PutBucketLifecycle"
   and event.outcome == "success"
   and stringContains(aws.cloudtrail.request_parameters, "Expiration=")

Install detection rules in Elastic Security

Detect AWS S3 Bucket Expiration Lifecycle Configuration Added 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).