+
+.section "Inbound proxies" SECTproxyInbound
+.cindex proxy inbound
+.cindex proxy "server side"
+.cindex proxy "Proxy protocol"
+.cindex "Proxy protocol" proxy
+
+Exim has support for receiving inbound SMTP connections via a proxy
+that uses &"Proxy Protocol"& to speak to it.
+To include this support, include &"SUPPORT_PROXY=yes"&
+in Local/Makefile.
+
+It was built on specifications from:
+http://haproxy.1wt.eu/download/1.5/doc/proxy-protocol.txt
+That URL was revised in May 2014 to version 2 spec:
+http://git.1wt.eu/web?p=haproxy.git;a=commitdiff;h=afb768340c9d7e50d8e
+
+The purpose of this facility is so that an application load balancer,
+such as HAProxy, can sit in front of several Exim servers
+to distribute load.
+Exim uses the local protocol communication with the proxy to obtain
+the remote SMTP system IP address and port information.
+There is no logging if a host passes or
+fails Proxy Protocol negotiation, but it can easily be determined and
+recorded in an ACL (example is below).
+
+Use of a proxy is enabled by setting the &%hosts_proxy%&
+main configuration option to a hostlist; connections from these
+hosts will use Proxy Protocol.
+
+To log the IP of the proxy in the incoming logline, add &"+proxy"&
+to the &%log_selector%& option.
+This will add a component tagged with &"PRX="& to the line.
+
+The following expansion variables are usable
+(&"internal"& and &"external"& here refer to the interfaces
+of the proxy):
+.display
+&'proxy_host_address '& internal IP address of the proxy
+&'proxy_host_port '& internal TCP port of the proxy
+&'proxy_target_address '& external IP address of the proxy
+&'proxy_target_port '& external TCP port of the proxy
+&'proxy_session '& boolean: SMTP connection via proxy
+.endd
+If &$proxy_session$& is set but &$proxy_host_address$& is empty
+there was a protocol error.
+
+Since the real connections are all coming from the proxy, and the
+per host connection tracking is done before Proxy Protocol is
+evaluated, &%smtp_accept_max_per_host%& must be set high enough to
+handle all of the parallel volume you expect per inbound proxy.
+With the option set so high, you lose the ability
+to protect your server from many connections from one IP.
+In order to prevent your server from overload, you
+need to add a per connection ratelimit to your connect ACL.
+A possible solution is:
+.display
+ # Set max number of connections per host
+ LIMIT = 5
+ # Or do some kind of IP lookup in a flat file or database
+ # LIMIT = ${lookup{$sender_host_address}iplsearch{/etc/exim/proxy_limits}}
+
+ defer message = Too many connections from this IP right now
+ ratelimit = LIMIT / 5s / per_conn / strict
+.endd
+
+
+