An adversary may delete a cloud instance after they have performed malicious activities in an attempt to evade detection and remove evidence of their presence.  Deleting an instance or virtual machine can remove valuable forensic artifacts and other evidence of suspicious behavior if the instance is not recoverable.

An adversary may also [Create Cloud Instance](https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1578/002) and later terminate the instance after achieving their objectives.(Citation: Mandiant M-Trends 2020)
Delete Cloud Instance
source_name: mitre-attack  url: https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1578/003  external_id: T1578.003     source_name: Mandiant M-Trends 2020  description: Mandiant. (2020, February). M-Trends 2020. Retrieved April 24, 2020.  url: https://content.fireeye.com/m-trends/rpt-m-trends-2020     source_name: AWS CloudTrail Search  description: Amazon. (n.d.). Search CloudTrail logs for API calls to EC2 Instances. Retrieved June 17, 2020.  url: https://aws.amazon.com/premiumsupport/knowledge-center/cloudtrail-search-api-calls/     source_name: Azure Activity Logs  description: Microsoft. (n.d.). View Azure activity logs. Retrieved June 17, 2020.  url: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/azure-resource-manager/management/view-activity-logs     source_name: Cloud Audit Logs  description: Google. (n.d.). Audit Logs. Retrieved June 1, 2020.  url: https://cloud.google.com/logging/docs/audit#admin-activity     