arpwatch does not support a configuration file, but the systemd unit files shipped with Debian allow to launch arpwatch with different configurations on each interface In order to do that, create a file called IFNAME.iface which contains variable assignments in sh syntax (comments are allowed). You can use the following variables to influence the invocation for that specific interface only: * ARGS: overwrite the ARGS from /etc/default/arpwatch * PCAP_FILTER: overwrite (or set) the pcap filter * IFACE_ARGS: additional options to be passed to arpwatch See `man 8 arpwatch` for available arguments. Note that the -f, -i and -u options are added by the init system and should not used. If you just want to apply the options specified in /etc/default/arpwatch for an interface you do not need to create a configuration file. For example, if you want to send mails about arpwatch events on eth0 to arpwatch+eth0@example.com, you can generate the configuration file using the following command: echo 'IFACE_ARGS="-m arpwatch+eth0@example.com"' > /etc/arpwatch/eth0.iface