Techniques of the present disclosure provide an embodiment of a multistage filter (MSF) that takes a rate limiting parameter. The entries of the MSF are updated upon each access. Each update may cause a different breakdown of entries in the MSF and the entries can be dynamically set to reduce collisions and their impact. In some embodiments, the MSF is: configured based on the rate limiting parameter, used to dynamically monitor network traffic and changing assignments, and adjustable in size. In some embodiments, hashing is performed on a per-row basis and seeding initializes entries of the buckets to entries that are the same within a given row and different within a given column.