How to Import an AWS GuardDuty Detector into Terraform

Import AWS GuardDuty Detector with Terraback (recommended)

Terraback reverse-engineers your live infrastructure: it reads the Amazon GuardDuty resource with read-only credentials, generates the HCL, and produces the exact import block. Two commands take you from a live AWS GuardDuty Detector to managed Terraform.

terraback scan all aws --region us-east-1

terraback aws import --method bulk

The Terraform import block

Terraback emits a Terraform 1.5+ import block like the one below. Because the block lives in your configuration, the import is reviewable in a pull request and repeatable across environments.

import {
  to = aws_guardduty_detector.main
  id = "12abc34d567e8fa901bc2d34e56789f0"
}

Example aws_guardduty_detector configuration

Here is a realistic AWS GuardDuty Detector block. Terraback generates a fuller version from your actual resource attributes; this is a minimal, valid starting point.

resource "aws_guardduty_detector" "main" {
  enable                       = true
  finding_publishing_frequency = "SIX_HOURS"
}

Gotchas when importing a AWS GuardDuty Detector

• There is one detector per account per region; importing the existing detector avoids the 'detector already exists' error on first apply.
• The data source toggles (S3 logs, Kubernetes audit logs, malware protection) are increasingly managed via the separate aws_guardduty_detector_feature resource in newer provider versions.
• Member account invitations, IP sets, threat intel sets, and filters are all separate GuardDuty resources.
• Disabling the detector (enable = false) suspends findings rather than deleting history; destroying it removes the detector entirely.

Doing it manually with terraform import

The native approach is to write the aws_guardduty_detector block by hand, then run terraform import aws_guardduty_detector.example <import-id> for every resource, one at a time. That works for a handful of resources, but it does not scale: you author all the HCL yourself and repeat the command for each item. Terraback generates the HCL and the import blocks for your whole account in one pass.

Import other AWS resources