I have fail2ban running on Ubuntu 16, with a few jails running.
One is http-get-dos:
Within jail.conf
[http-get-dos]
enabled = true
port = http,https
filter = http-get-dos
logpath = /var/log/apache2/access.log
maxretry = 100
findtime = 60
#ban for 5 minutes
bantime = 600
action = iptables[name=HTTP, port=http, protocol=tcp]
Filter file:
# Fail2Ban configuration file
[Definition]
# Option: failregex
# Note: This regex will match any GET entry in your logs, so basically all valid and not valid entries are a match.
# You should set up in the jail.conf file, the maxretry and findtime carefully in order to avoid false positives.
failregex = ^<HOST> -.*"(GET|POST).*
# Option: ignoreregex
ignoreregex =
The jail within Fail2Ban seems to be working fine - I just tested it by hammering the URL, and my IP was added into the IP Tables.
However, I am not actually blocked - the IP Tables REJECT is not working it seems.
my.ip.address appears in IP Tables within Chain fail2ban-HTTP a REJECT, but I'm not rejected (can still access the site)
iptables -nvL --line-numbers
Chain INPUT (policy ACCEPT 2689 packets, 413K bytes)
num pkts bytes target prot opt in out source destination
1 68 5849 fail2ban-HTTP tcp -- * * 0.0.0.0/0 0.0.0.0/0 tcp dpt:80
2 3104 575K fail2ban-apache-overflows tcp -- * * 0.0.0.0/0 0.0.0.0/0 multiport dports 80,443
3 3104 575K fail2ban-apache tcp -- * * 0.0.0.0/0 0.0.0.0/0 multiport dports 80,443
4 728 43824 fail2ban-ssh tcp -- * * 0.0.0.0/0 0.0.0.0/0 multiport dports 22
Chain FORWARD (policy ACCEPT 0 packets, 0 bytes)
num pkts bytes target prot opt in out source destination
Chain OUTPUT (policy ACCEPT 3325 packets, 4380K bytes)
num pkts bytes target prot opt in out source destination
Chain fail2ban-HTTP (1 references)
num pkts bytes target prot opt in out source destination
1 0 0 REJECT all -- * * my.ip.address
0.0.0.0/0 reject-with icmp-port-unreachable
2 68 5849 RETURN all -- * * 0.0.0.0/0 0.0.0.0/0
Chain fail2ban-apache (1 references)
num pkts bytes target prot opt in out source destination
1 3104 575K RETURN all -- * * 0.0.0.0/0 0.0.0.0/0
Chain fail2ban-apache-overflows (1 references)
num pkts bytes target prot opt in out source destination
1 3104 575K RETURN all -- * * 0.0.0.0/0 0.0.0.0/0
Chain fail2ban-ssh (1 references)
num pkts bytes target prot opt in out source destination
1 728 43824 RETURN all -- * * 0.0.0.0/0 0.0.0.0/0
I'm wondering if it's an order problem - i.e. a global ACCEPT is trumping the fail2ban rule in IPTables. But if this is the problem, I don't know how to fix it, and why fail2ban didn't put it high enough in the first place.
Any advice, most appreciated.