AWS CloudTrail Trail Stop/Update/Delete Activity

ATT&CK techniques

Recon
Resource Dev
Initial Access
Execution
Persistence
Priv Esc
Defense Evasion
Cred Access
Discovery
Lateral Movement
Collection
C2
Exfiltration
Impact

What it detects

This rule flags CloudTrail control-plane events that stop logging, update an existing trail, or delete a trail. Attackers often target these actions to impair audit visibility, disrupt monitoring, or alter what data is recorded. Detection relies on AWS CloudTrail event fields indicating eventSource and matching the eventName values for StopLogging, UpdateTrail, or DeleteTrail.

Reporting behind it

Related detections7 linkedT1685.002 — drag to rearrange

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Suspicious AWS CloudTrail Logging Disabled

Suspicious GCP Log Sink Tampering for Defense Evasion (via gcp)

AWS CloudTrail GuardDuty Detector Deleted or Disabled via UpdateDetector

AWS CloudTrail: AWS Config Delivery Channel/Recorder Disabled

AWS CloudTrail Trail Stop/Update/Delete Activity

Pivot detection · T1685.002 · 7 related

Changelog

v5

v5
Candidate ingested via manual entry.2026-07-31
v4
Candidate ingested via manual entry.2026-07-31
v3
Candidate ingested via manual entry.2026-07-31
v2
Candidate ingested via manual entry.2026-07-31
v1
No changelog recorded for this version.2026-07-30

Detection content is published as a reviewed draft. Tune thresholds and exclusions against your own telemetry before enabling this rule for alerting.

aws-cloudtrail-stoplogging-updatetrail-and-deletetrail-changes-4db60cc0

title: AWS CloudTrail Trail Stop/Update/Delete Activity
id: 56b2ca4b-4a9e-4e15-80f3-b793856919ee
status: test
description: This rule flags CloudTrail control-plane events that stop logging, update an existing trail, or delete a trail. Attackers often target these actions to impair audit visibility, disrupt monitoring, or alter what data is recorded. Detection relies on AWS CloudTrail event fields indicating eventSource and matching the eventName values for StopLogging, UpdateTrail, or DeleteTrail.
references:
  - https://docs.aws.amazon.com/awscloudtrail/latest/userguide/best-practices-security.html
  - https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/master/rules/cloud/aws/cloudtrail/aws_cloudtrail_disable_logging.yml
author: vitaliy0x1, Huntrule Team
date: 2020-01-21
modified: 2022-10-09
tags:
  - attack.defense-impairment
  - attack.t1685.002
logsource:
  product: aws
  service: cloudtrail
detection:
  selection_source:
    eventSource: cloudtrail.amazonaws.com
    eventName:
      - StopLogging
      - UpdateTrail
      - DeleteTrail
  condition: selection_source
falsepositives:
  - Valid change in a Trail
level: medium
license: DRL-1.1
related:
  - id: 4db60cc0-36fb-42b7-9b58-a5b53019fb74
    type: derived

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