Encrypting Web.Config

Have you tried this: http://weblogs.asp.net/scottgu/archive/2006/01/09/434893.aspx

Here are the commands to encrypt web.config file without any programming...

For encryption

aspnet_regiis -pef "Section" "Path exluding web.config"

For Decryption

aspnet_regiis -pdf "Section" "Path exluding web.config"

From this commands you can encrypt or decrypt all the section.

I believe there are two ways of doing this:

using aspnet_regiis using DPAPI or RSA, or doing it programmatically.

The programmatic way can be handy, particularly if you also like to encrypt app.config.

From my experiences of using this, if you write a custom configuration section, you have install the DLL containing the classes for that section into the GAC. For a project I was working I basically scripted the following approach:

• Copy config DLL to GAC.
• Perform encryption.
• Remove config DLL from GAC.

Chances are if you are just encrypting connection strings then this won't be a problem. You also need to be bear in mind whether you want to encrypt on a machine wide basis or to a specific user account- both options can be useful depending on your scenario. For simplicity I stuck to machine wide encryption. The links I have provided explain the merits of both approaches.