How to Import an Azure Application Security Group into Terraform

Import Azure Application Security Group with Terraback (recommended)

Terraback reverse-engineers your live infrastructure: it reads the Azure Networking resource with read-only credentials, generates the HCL, and produces the exact import block. Two commands take you from a live Azure Application Security Group to managed Terraform.

terraback scan all azure --subscription-id YOUR_ID

terraback azure 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 = azurerm_application_security_group.web
  id = "/subscriptions/00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000/resourceGroups/prod-rg/providers/Microsoft.Network/applicationSecurityGroups/web-asg"
}

Example azurerm_application_security_group configuration

Here is a realistic Azure Application Security Group block. Terraback generates a fuller version from your actual resource attributes; this is a minimal, valid starting point.

resource "azurerm_application_security_group" "web" {
  name                = "web-asg"
  location            = "eastus"
  resource_group_name = "prod-rg"

  tags = {
    Environment = "production"
  }
}

Gotchas when importing a Azure Application Security Group

• An application security group only has name, location, resource_group_name, and tags; the membership lives on network interfaces and NSG rules, not here.
• Network interfaces reference it via application_security_group_ids, and those associations import as part of the NIC, not the ASG.
• NSG rules that target it use source_application_security_group_ids / destination_application_security_group_ids and are imported with the NSG.
• An ASG and the resources referencing it must live in the same region.

Doing it manually with terraform import

The native approach is to write the azurerm_application_security_group block by hand, then run terraform import azurerm_application_security_group.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 Azure resources