"Event ID 172: Connectivity state in standby: Disconnected, Reason: NIC Compliance" on a VM that loses network connectivity

Products

• VMware vCenter Server
• VMware vSphere ESXi

Issue/Introduction

• A Windows VM has lost network connectivity at the Guest OS level.
• VM may fall back to an APIPA address (169.254.x.x)
• The ESX logs and VM logs were investigated, and no issues were found with the hypervisor or the VM hardware at the time of the disconnect. 
• In the Windows system logs, the following event ID and message are found:
  

  172: Connectivity state in standby: Disconnected, Reason: NIC compliance

Environment

VMware vCenter Server
VMware vSphere ESXi

Cause

The Windows operating system has flagged a compliance issue with the NIC and has disconnected the NIC from the network. 

Resolution

We recommend contacting Microsoft Support to investigate why the Network Interface Card (NIC) transitioned into a disconnected state due to compliance policies.