Talk:Block SMTP Authentication Attacks With Fail2Ban

configure fail2ban to startup on boot

chkconfig --add fail2ban
# chkconfig fail2ban on

Informative sources

Protecting your server from attacks with fail2ban

• tips for setting up fail2ban for apache, dovecot, etc

Blocking brute force attacks to Dovecot on CentOS

• has clear regex example. wrongly suggests directly editing jail.conf

How To Protect SSH with fail2ban on CentOS 6

• very current, however, specific to protecting ssh, not covering dovecot

Using Fail2ban with Dovecot

• somewhat outdated. documentation from dovecot site.

Secure a CentOS 6 Mail server with Fail2ban

• in theory this should be the most current and specific guide.