diff --git a/src/main/java/com/google/devtools/build/lib/bazel/bzlmod/SingleExtensionEvalFunction.java b/src/main/java/com/google/devtools/build/lib/bazel/bzlmod/SingleExtensionEvalFunction.java
index 8edc8cc781caf0..3d521fb2e8ac4e 100644
--- a/src/main/java/com/google/devtools/build/lib/bazel/bzlmod/SingleExtensionEvalFunction.java
+++ b/src/main/java/com/google/devtools/build/lib/bazel/bzlmod/SingleExtensionEvalFunction.java
@@ -946,7 +946,7 @@ public RunModuleExtensionResult run(
           } catch (IOException e1) {
             ExternalDepsException externalDepsException =
                 ExternalDepsException.withCauseAndMessage(
-                    ExternalDeps.Code.UNRECOGNIZED,
+                    ExternalDeps.Code.EXTERNAL_DEPS_UNKNOWN,
                     e1,
                     "Failed to clean up module context directory");
             throw new SingleExtensionEvalFunctionException(