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A firewall rule that repeatedly returns to an earlier value is being written or reconciled by something; the symptom alone does not identify what. In the DEV Community index, Sergey Shinder’s September 16 post is listed under Terraform, IaC, and DevOps with the title “A firewall rule with two owners changed itself back every three hours,” but the indexed result does not include the post’s text. Its platform, the two owners, the cause, and the fix therefore cannot be confirmed. The useful first step is to establish which system wrote the rule each time.
What the recurring change tells you—and what it does not
A repeated return to an earlier setting is evidence of recurring writes or reconciliation. It is not, by itself, evidence that Terraform changed the rule, that a scheduled apply ran, or that a particular state-locking problem occurred. The available DEV Community listing does not identify the firewall platform or the actor responsible for the reported three-hour interval.
Start with the rule’s actual values and timestamps. Then use the relevant audit history to identify the actor behind each write. A cadence can help narrow the search, but it cannot identify the controller without logs or other system evidence.
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Collect evidence before changing the rule again
Build a timeline around at least one observed reversion. Capture the rule’s value before and after the change, the exact timestamps, and any audit event associated with each write. Keep the investigation focused on evidence that can distinguish a desired configuration from the system that applied it.
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- Firewall or cloud audit history: Find the write event and the actor or service identity associated with it, if the platform records those details.
- Terraform plan and state: Inspect what Terraform currently believes and what a plan proposes to change. A plan can show a configuration, state, and remote-object difference; it does not execute the proposed actions.
- Terraform workflow: Record the workspace, backend, and state lineage used by each relevant run. Check whether more than one workflow can manage the same rule.
- Other writers: Check scheduled pipelines and any separate policy or configuration managers that can modify the same object.
These are investigative avenues, not findings about Shinder’s post. The accessible listing does not say which evidence was available or what the author found.
What Terraform state locking can—and cannot—establish
HashiCorp’s current v1.16.x documentation says, “If supported by your backend, Terraform will lock your state for all operations that could write state.” Locking is automatic for write-capable operations when the backend supports it, and Terraform does not continue if it cannot acquire the lock. See HashiCorp’s state-locking documentation.
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A lock is scoped to the relevant state workflow. It does not show that separate states, another Terraform workflow, or an unrelated management system are coordinated with one another. Check backend support and determine which state each writer uses before treating locking as an explanation for a recurring change.
Do not force-unlock merely because a run appears stuck. HashiCorp warns that unlocking a state while another person or process still holds the lock can permit multiple writers. Force-unlock is intended for your own lock when automatic unlocking has failed; consult the official guidance before using it.
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Use a plan to inspect Terraform’s proposed changes
HashiCorp describes a normal terraform plan as reading remote objects, comparing them with configuration and prior state, and proposing actions to make the remote objects match the configuration. A plan is a preview: it does not apply those actions. That makes it useful for seeing whether Terraform proposes a change to the rule, but it does not identify every possible writer. See the Terraform plan reference.
Compare the plan with the audit timeline. If a plan proposes the same value that appears after a reversion, Terraform configuration may be relevant; that correspondence alone still does not prove a particular run caused the write. The audit event and its actor are stronger evidence of who made each change.
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Choose a reconciliation path only after ownership is clear
First agree on the intended rule and identify which configuration or system is authoritative. If an out-of-band change was intentional and Terraform should record the resulting remote value, HashiCorp documents refresh-only planning as a way to update Terraform state and root outputs to match intentional changes made outside the normal Terraform workflow. It is not a universal remedy for competing writers.
If Terraform’s configuration is meant to remain authoritative, a normal plan may propose restoring the configured value when the remote rule differs. If another system is meant to own the rule, clarify that boundary before applying changes. Otherwise, one controller may undo what another has just written. This is a general operational implication of Terraform’s documented comparison behavior, not a confirmed account of the indexed incident.
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How to read the “every three hours” detail
The interval is a clue for lining up audit events with pipeline schedules or other recurring management activity. It is not enough to conclude that a job ran on that schedule: the indexed title supplies no logs, schedule, or controller identity. Treat the interval as a filter for the timeline, not as a diagnosis.
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