Microsoft's answer to brute force mitigation - $$$

 How to avoid successful SSH Brute Force Attack - Microsoft Q&A

mentions Just-in-time access usage. But that

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/defender-for-cloud/just-in-time-access-usage

requires Defender for Cloud Plan 2

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/defender-for-cloud/plan-defender-for-servers-select-plan#plan-features

which costs nearly $15 per month per server!

https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/pricing/details/defender-for-cloud/