Re-evaluating the exceptions for selected records in the Vulnerability Manager Workspace

reference brazil Updated Sep 10, 2026 4 min read vmws-exception-rules-scenarios.md
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In the Vulnerability Manager Workspace, when you evaluate the exception rules for a set of records in the Re-evaluate and update the remediation properties modal, their deferral status and until date of deferral are updated as per the latest exception rules.

Scenarios

You may come across the following scenarios, when you evaluate the exceptions for a selected set of records in the Re-evaluate and update the remediation properties modal in the Vulnerability Manager Workspace:

Scenario 1: When the selected records are already deferred manually and they match the condition of an exception rule, these records remain in the Deferred state without any changes.

Scenario 2: When the selected records match the condition in the exception rules and these records are in a non-deferral state (such as open, In Review, Under Investigation), then these records are deferred until the date defined in the exception rule.

Scenario 3: When the selected records are already in the Deferred state (that are deferred using the exception rule A), they remain in the Deferred state in the following scenarios:

  • the exception rule expires and the records do not match the condition
  • the exception rule expires and the records match the condition
  • the exception rule A expires and records match the condition of another exception rule B.

Scenario 4: Consider that the records are deferred using an exception rule. When you change the exception rule condition such that the Deferred state of the records is no longer valid and then reevaluate the exception rules for these records:

  • the records move to the Open state
  • the Until date, Deferral date, Deferral count and other fields are updated.

Consider that you are evaluating the exceptions for following host vulnerable items (VITs)

Consider the exception rule with the following details:

Field Description Value
Name Name of the exception rule. Deferring critical VITs
Valid from Date from which this rule is active to defer the VIs. 20-08-2024
Valid to Date from which the remediation task stops accepting new VIs. 30-11-2024
Reason Reason to create this exception rule. Risk Accepted
Assignment group Group that the remediation task that was created for tracking the deferred VIs is assigned to. Remediation Group 1
Additional information Additional information that the requester wants to provide to the approver. This information is populated in the description field of the remediation task. This rule has been created to defer the critical VITs automatically.
Condition Filter condition for the VIs that can be defined while processing the VIs. Risk rating = 5 - Critical
Execute on existing data Option that enables you to run this rule on existing data the first time that this rule is run. Yes
State State of the exception rule. Approved
Execution order Unique order for each exception rule. 100
Deferred until Date until when the VULs and VIs are deferred. On this date, the created VUL is closed, all the VIs move out of the group, and group rules are reapplied. 2024-12-23 16:10:29

The following table shows how the state changes when the exception rules are reevaluated for multiple VITs simultaneously:

VIT Number State Risk Rating Updated state after reevaluating the exceptions -1 Until date - 1
VIT120067 Open 2 - Low Open -
VIT120068 In Review 3 - Medium In Review -
VIT120069 Under Investigation 5 - Critical Deferred 2024-12-23 16:10:29
VIT120070 Deferred 5 - Critical Deferred 2024-12-23 16:10:29
VIT120071 Deferred 2 - Low Deferred 2024-10-02 16:10:29 (Deferred manually)
VIT120072 Closed 5 - Critical Closed -

When the condition in the preceding exception rule is modified to Risk rating = 2 - Low and Deferred until is modified to 2024-12-31 14:10:23 the records are updated as follows:

VIT Number Updated state after reevaluating the exceptions -1 Risk-rating Updated state after reevaluating the exceptions - 2 until date - 2
VIT120067 Open 2 - Low Deferred 2024-12-31 14:10:23
VIT120068 In Review 3 - Medium In Review -
VIT120069 Deferred 5 - Critical Deferred 2024-12-23 16:10:29
VIT120070 Deferred 5 - Critical Deferred 2024-12-23 16:10:29
VIT120071 Deferred 2 - Low Deferred (No change in the state) 2024-10-02 16:10:29 (No change in the until date)
VIT120072 Closed 5 - Critical Closed -

Related topics

Re-evaluate the remediation properties of the records in the Vulnerability Manager Workspace

Exception rules overview

Configuration Compliance Exception Management overview

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