Removing assignments from findings and remediation tasks

Release version: Australia

Updated March 12, 2026

2 minutes to read

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Summary of Removing assignments from findings and remediation tasks

ServiceNow Australia release enables remediation owners and vulnerability analysts to remove themselves or their groups from theAssigned toandAssignment groupfields on findings and remediation tasks. This functionality, accessed via theUnassignUI action, facilitates routing records to appropriate owners when assignments are incorrect or outside the user’s scope.

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Practical Use

Users should use the Unassign option when a finding or remediation task is irrelevant to their responsibilities or was mistakenly assigned. Records can be unassigned in any state except Closed or Resolved. For remediation tasks, unassigning also removes assignments from associated findings sharing the same assignment group. Findings or tasks assigned to different groups remain unaffected.

Approval Workflow and Configuration

By default, unassigning triggers an approval workflow if the system property snvul.unassignvr.approvalrequired is set to true. Approvals appear under My Approvals. Upon approval, assignments are cleared, the assignment type is set to Unassigned, and records may be reassigned automatically to a default group specified in snvul.defaultassignmentgroup, which also receives notifications.

If unassignment is rejected, the reason is recorded in the Notes tab.
Vulnerability administrators can disable approvals by setting snvul.unassignvr.approvalrequired to false.
Administrators can redirect unassigned records to a specified group by configuring snvul.defaultassignmentgroup.
Notifications are managed via the Unassign notification user group if no default group is set.

The assignment type field (Manual, Rule, or Unassigned) indicates how the record was last assigned and appears in both record and list views.

Monitoring and Reporting

A scheduled daily job tracks unassigned records to evaluate assignment rule effectiveness. It counts findings reassigned to Unassigned, manually unassigned records, and system-unassigned records. These counts appear in the Assignment Rules list with columns for Manual items count and Unassigned items count.

To view these metrics, navigate to:

Workspaces > Security Exposure Management Workspace
Select Administration > Review on the Assignment rules tile
Use the gear icon to add reassignment columns to the list view

This allows customers to identify assignment rules that may require tuning based on reassignment activity.

You can remove yourself or your group from the Assigned to and Assignment group fields on findings and remediation tasks if you believe they were incorrectly assigned.

Overview of the workflow

Remediation owners and vulnerability analysts can unassign records using the Unassign UI action. This helps route records that are outside their scope to the appropriate owners.

Use case

Use the Unassign option when a finding or remediation task is not relevant to your scope or was mistakenly assigned to you or your group.

Unassigning from findings and remediation tasks

You can unassign records in any state except Closed or Resolved, using the Unassign button or the More options menu ( Vertical dots ).

Supported Records:

Remediation tasks: When a remediation task is unassigned, all associated findings with the same assignment group are also unassigned.
Note:
Items with a different assignment group than their remediation task are not unassigned, as they are likely manually assigned.
Findings: Records unassigned manually or via UI appear under the Unassigned module.

Any records that you update assignments for with the UI action or manually are displayed on the Unassigned module.

Approval workflow and system properties

By default, unassigning a record triggers an approval workflow if the system property sn_vul.unassign_vr.approval_required is set to true. This generates an approval request that appears under My Approvals. If approved:

The Assigned to and Assignment group fields are cleared.
The Assignment type is set to Unassigned.
The record can be optionally reassigned to a group defined in sn_vul.default_assignment_group.
Notifications are sent to the new group.
If rejected, the reason appears in the Notes tab.

As a vulnerability administrator, you can:

Disable approvals by setting sn_vul.unassign_vr.approval_required to false.
Redirect unassigned records to a specific group by setting its sys_id in sn_vul.default_assignment_group.
Manage notifications using the Unassign notification user group if no default group is set.

The Assignment type (Manual, Rule, or Unassigned) helps identify how a record was last assigned. When unassigned, this field is set to Unassigned and is visible on both the record and list views.

Monitoring unassignments with scheduled jobs

A daily Reassignment count for assignment rules scheduled job tracks unassigned records to assess assignment rule effectiveness. This job counts:

Findings reassigned to Unassigned.
Manually unassigned records.
System-unassigned records

These counts appear in the Assignment Rules list under the following columns:

Manual items count
Unassigned items count

To view reassignment counts:

Navigate to Workspaces > Security Exposure Management Workspace.
Select Administration in the navigation pane.
Select Review on the Assignment rules tile.
On the Rules page, select Assignment in the navigation pane.
Use the gear icon to add both reassignment columns to the list view.

Each reassigned record retains a reference to its original assignment rule. The list view displays reassignment counts for each assignment rule, helping you identify rules that may need adjustment.

The following example shows reassignment counts for two assignment rules.

Reassignment counts for two assignment rules for Vulnerability Response VITs.