Why does the native cloudwatch integration fail with 'Alert Message Cannot Be Empty" error?

[Josh Wentworth]

We are using the native cloudwatch integration, we have a cloudwatch alarm, an sns topic, and an sns subscription that all are valid and working.

Error Description

The CloudWatch integration is receiving notifications from AWS SNS, correctly parsing many of the fields, but failing to create alerts in Jira. The specific error message shown in the logs is:

"Discarded incoming data. Reason: Alert message can not be empty!"

The logs show that Jira is successfully:

1. Receiving the SNS notification
2. Starting to execute the "Create Alert" action
3. Parsing data from the notification including AlarmName, NewStateValue, AlarmDescription, etc.

However, it's discarding the data with the "Alert message can not be empty!" error despite all fields appearing to be present in the parsed data.

Parsed Data Example

The logs show the following fields are successfully parsed from the CloudWatch notification:

• AWSAccountId: 123456789 (altered for privacy)
• TopicArn: arn:aws:sns:us-east-1:123456789 (altered for privacy)
• NewStateReason: Test notification for Jira integration
• NewStateValue: ALARM
• StateChangeTime: 2025-04-23T13:00:00.000Z
• Type: Notification
• AlarmDescription: Test alarm for Jira Service Management integration
• AlarmName: JiraIntegration-TestAlert
• OldStateValue: OK
• Region: us-east-1

Multiple message formats have been tried, including direct JSON payloads and standard CloudWatch alarm notifications, all resulting in the same error. We've confirmed through logs that the message is being received and parsed correctly, but the alert creation is failing.

Troubleshooting Performed

1. Verified SNS subscription is confirmed
2. Confirmed CloudWatch alarm is properly configured and triggering
3. Tested multiple message formats via direct SNS publishing
4. Validated API key matches between integration configuration and SNS subscription
5. Checked Jira logs to confirm messages are being received and processed
6. Attempted to create direct alerts in Jira to verify general alert functionality

We request assistance in identifying what specific message format or field content the Jira CloudWatch integration requires to successfully create alerts from CloudWatch notifications.

[Upasna Bassi]

@Josh Wentworth - Could you also please share screenshot of your Opsgenie integration configuration? Will help us troubleshoot this faster.

[Josh Wentworth]

Ops Genie doesn't really exist anymore. I can't visit the old opsgenie site. Where within Jira would the screenshot you're looking for be located?