diff --git a/CHANGELOG.asciidoc b/CHANGELOG.asciidoc
index c1b5f38c0455..bc08934348e8 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.asciidoc
+++ b/CHANGELOG.asciidoc
@@ -38,6 +38,7 @@ https://github.com/elastic/beats/compare/v7.0.0-alpha1...master[Check the HEAD d
 - Fix autodiscover configurations stopping when metadata is missing. {pull}8851[8851]
 - Log events at the debug level when dropped by encoding problems. {pull}9251[9251]
 - Refresh host metadata in add_host_metadata. {pull}9359[9359]
+- When collecting swap metrics for beats telemetry or system metricbeat module handle cases of free swap being bigger than total swap by assuming no swap is being used. {issue}6271[6271] {pull}9383[9383]
 
 *Auditbeat*
 
diff --git a/libbeat/metric/system/memory/memory.go b/libbeat/metric/system/memory/memory.go
index 594fc616c198..585c80d5c743 100644
--- a/libbeat/metric/system/memory/memory.go
+++ b/libbeat/metric/system/memory/memory.go
@@ -21,6 +21,7 @@ package memory
 
 import (
 	"github.com/elastic/beats/libbeat/common"
+	"github.com/elastic/beats/libbeat/logp"
 	sigar "github.com/elastic/gosigar"
 )
 
@@ -69,6 +70,17 @@ func GetSwap() (*SwapStat, error) {
 		return nil, err
 	}
 
+	// This shouldn't happen, but it has been reported to happen and
+	// this can provoke too big values for used swap.
+	// Workaround this by assuming that all swap is free in that case.
+	if swap.Free > swap.Total || swap.Used > swap.Total {
+		logp.Debug("memory",
+			"Unexpected values for swap memory - total: %v free: %v used: %v.  Setting swap used to 0.",
+			swap.Total, swap.Free, swap.Used)
+		swap.Free = swap.Total
+		swap.Used = 0
+	}
+
 	return &SwapStat{Swap: swap}, nil
 }