Unable to protect the virtual machine under VMware Live Recovery

Products

• VMware vSphere ESXi

Issue/Introduction

When attempting to protect a virtual machine (VM) under VMware Live Site Recovery, the operation fails with the following error message:

Error: Permission to perform this operation was denied. You do not hold privilege "Virtual machine > SRM Protection > Protect" on virtual machine.

Environment

VMware Live Recovery

Cause

This issue occurs because the user account or group initiating the protection task lacks the required Site Recovery Manager (SRM) specific privileges at the Virtual Machine object level in vCenter Server.
Even if the user has a standard administrator or power user role, SRM privileges must be explicitly granted if custom roles are in use.

Resolution

To resolve this issue, you must assign the missing privilege to the affected user or group within the vCenter Server inventory.

Step 1: Verify Current Permissions

1. Log in to the vSphere Client.
2. Navigate Menu > Administration > Roles.
3. Click the Roles tab and locate the user or group experiencing the issue.
4. Note the Role assigned to that user/group.

Step 2: Edit or Create a Role with SRM Privileges

1. Go to Menu > Administration > Roles.
2. Select the custom role identified in Step 1 
3. Expand the Virtual machine privilege category.
4. Scroll down to SRM Protection (or Live Site Recovery Protection depending on your vSphere version).
5. Check the box for Protect.
6. Click Save.

Step 3: Verify the Fix

1. Return to the virtual machine or the Live Site Recovery plugin interface.
2. Re-run the Protect Virtual Machine task.
3. Verify that the task completes successfully without permission errors.

Additional Information

* Ensure that permissions are propagated down the hierarchy if assigned at a datacenter or folder level.
* For comprehensive management, ensure the user also has accompanying SRM privileges like Unprotect or Manage protection if they are responsible for ongoing lifecycle management of the recovery plans.