Azure Virtual Machines

VM Boot Diagnostic Disabled

Risk Level: Medium

Description

This plugin guarantees that the VM boot diagnostics is enabled for virtual machines. Boot diagnostics is a troubleshooting highlight for Azure virtual machines (VM) that permits the finding of VM boot disappointments. Boot diagnostics enables a client to notice the condition of their VM as it is booting up by gathering sequential log data and screen captures.

About the Service

Azure Virtual Machine:

Azure Virtual Machines (VM) is one of several forms of scalable, on-demand computing resources offered by Azure. VMs are typically used when you require more control over the computing environment than the other options provide. This article explains what you should think about before creating a virtual machine, how to construct one, and how to administer one. For more information, click here.

Impact

Boot Diagnostics empowers you to see the condition of your Azure virtual machine as it boots up. Empowering Boot Diagnostics highlight to permit the Microsoft Azure cloud stage to investigate the virtual machine working framework (OS) for provisioning blunders, assisting with giving further data on the main drivers of the startup disappointments.

Steps to Reproduce

In order to determine, if all the VM instances are configured to use Boot Diagnostics, follow the steps given below:

Using Azure Console-

  1. Firstly, sign in to the Azure Management Console with your registered organization email address.
  2. Under Azure Services, choose Subscriptions.
  3. A new Subscription page will be opened up. Choose the subscription for which the issue has to be examined.
  4. Now, in the Filter Type Box, search for Virtual Machines.
  5. Click on the Virtual Machines nav link. A list of all the virtual machines (VMs) in your selected subscription will be displayed on the screen.
  6. Click on the Name of the Virtual Machine, for which you want to examine.
  7. A detailed view of your selected virtual machine will be displayed. Now, in the navigation panel, under the Support + Troubleshooting, click on the Boot Diagnostics blade.
  8. A Boot Diagnostics page will appear, to list the feature data including Serial Logs and Screenshots, which are generated for the selected VM.
  9. If in case, instead of showing the feature data, it displays the message as ”Boot Diagnostics isn’t configured for this virtual machine. Click here to enable it.” Then the selected VM is not enabled with the Boot Diagnostics feature.
  10. Follow the steps above, for other Azure Virtual Machines (VMs) in the current subscription as well as in other subscriptions in your Azure Cloud.

Steps for Remediation

In order to enable the Boot Diagnostics feature for the Virtual Machines (VMs) in your Azure cloud account, follow the steps given below:

Using Azure Console-

  1. Firstly, sign in to the Azure Management Console with your registered organization email address.
  2. Under Azure Services, choose Subscriptions.
  3. A new Subscription page will be opened up. Choose the subscription for which the issue has to be examined.
  4. Now, in the Filter Type Box, search for Virtual Machines.
  5. Click on the Virtual Machines nav link. A list of all the virtual machines (VMs) in your selected subscription will be displayed on the screen.
  6. Click on the Name of the Virtual Machine, for which you want to examine.
  7. A detailed view of your selected virtual machine will be displayed. Now, in the navigation panel, under the Support + Troubleshooting, click on the Boot Diagnostics blade.
  8. A Boot Diagnostics page will appear, to list the feature data including Serial Logs and Screenshots, which are generated for the selected VM.
  9. Now, click on the Settings option, available on the top nav bar on the Boot Diagnostics page.
  10. Under, Status select ON to initiate the setup process. Now, from the Storage Account dropdown list choose an existing Azure Storage account. Or you may create new to deploy a new storage account.
  11. Click on the Save button to apply the changes and enable the Boot Diagnostics feature for the selected VM.
  12. Now, go to the Overview blade in the left navigation panel, and click on the Restart button, available at the top navbar.
  13. Now, click on the Yes option to confirm the restarting of VM instance.
  14. Follow the steps above, for other Azure Virtual Machines (VMs) in the current subscription as well as in other subscriptions in your Azure Cloud.