Credentials and security

Many remote queries and operations require authentication. The Network Scanner provides a central Credential Manager for storing and managing credentials securely.

Credential Manager

Choose Options → Credential Manager from the menu. The dialog shows four columns: Username, Password, Comment and Tag.

You can:

Add: create a new credential entry with a username, password, optional comment and tag.
Edit: modify an existing entry.
Delete: remove a selected entry.
Import / Export: transfer credentials between installations.

Each credential can have a unique Tag, a short identifier that lets scripts and custom applications reference it by name. For example, a VBScript can look up a credential by its tag to retrieve the username and password without hard-coding them in the script. Tags must be unique across all credentials.

Per-operation authentication

Several features allow you to choose which credentials to use. On the Workstation and Shares tabs in scan options, the authentication section at the bottom lets you select between your Current Account or a Specific Account from the Credential Manager. Click Manage to open the Credential Manager directly.

Remote queries such as WMI, SSH and SNMP also have their own authentication settings within each query dialog.

Master password

You can protect the application configuration with a master password. Choose File → Current Config → Set Master Password. When a master password is set, the configuration file is encrypted and the password is required each time the application starts or loads the configuration.

For automated operation, the master password can be passed on the command line with the /mpass switch to avoid interactive prompts.