How to Share Network Config with Support Tickets Safely

When your Cisco router goes down or your FortiGate firewall starts dropping traffic, the first call is to vendor support. They'll ask for your running config. It's the fastest way to diagnose the problem. The catch: your config contains active credentials that shouldn't leave your network.

ScrubForge solves exactly this: sanitize locally, then attach the clean version to your support ticket.

Why Raw Configs in Support Tickets Are a Risk

When you email a config file or attach it to a Cisco TAC case, Jira ticket, or vendor support portal, that file goes into a system you don't fully control. Depending on the vendor's security practices, your credentials may be:

Logged in support system databases
Accessible to support staff
Retained longer than you expect
Shared across internal teams for debugging

None of this is unusual. Most enterprise support systems are reasonably secure. But a production firewall config containing live VPN keys and admin passwords doesn't need to be in a support database at all. The vendor doesn't need your credentials to troubleshoot your config — they need the structure.

The ScrubForge + Support Ticket Workflow

Export your config — On Cisco IOS: show running-config. On FortiGate: System > Configuration > Download.
Open ScrubForge — Click the icon in your Chrome toolbar.
Paste and sanitize — Paste raw config. ScrubForge replaces passwords, keys, tokens, and SNMP strings with consistent placeholders like [PSK_1] or [ADMIN_PASS_1].
Review — Scan the output for anything that looks like live credentials. A 30-second check is good practice.
Attach to ticket — Copy the sanitized output into your support ticket or email, or save it as a .txt file and upload.

What to Include in Your Support Ticket

When attaching a sanitized config, add a one-line note:

"Config attached. Credentials have been sanitized (replaced with consistent placeholder tokens; structure and logic are intact)."

This tells the support engineer what they're looking at and why they won't see live values.

Most support engineers will immediately understand. They know the structure is what matters for troubleshooting — routing protocols, VPN peer IPs, firewall policies, interface configs. None of those are credentials.

Before and After

--- BEFORE (raw) ---
crypto isakmp key T@nn3lS3cr3t address 198.51.100.10
username admin password cisco123
snmp-server community public RO

--- AFTER (sanitized) ---
crypto isakmp key [PSK_1] address 198.51.100.10
username admin password [ADMIN_PASS_1]
snmp-server community [SNMP_RO_1] RO

The peer IP, interface names, and policies stay. The credentials don't.

This Works with Any Vendor

Whether it's Cisco, FortiGate, Palo Alto, Juniper, or pfSense, the principle is the same: sanitize text-based configs before sharing. ScrubForge detects common credential patterns in any text-based format.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: Can the support engineer still troubleshoot if credentials are replaced? A: Yes. Support engineers troubleshoot configuration logic — routing, VPN settings, firewall policies. None of that depends on seeing the actual credential value. The sanitized config gives them everything they need.

Q: What if the support ticket system stores files indefinitely? A: The benefit of sanitizing before uploading is that even if the ticket is never deleted or is accessed later, there are no live credentials in it. You've broken the link between your running network and the support database.

Q: Does ScrubForge affect network IP addresses? A: No. By default, ScrubForge replaces credential patterns — passwords, keys, tokens, SNMP strings — not IP addresses. Your network topology, peer IPs, and subnets stay intact, which is exactly what support engineers need to see.

Install ScrubForge

Free, local sanitization for any text-based config. Paste, strip credentials, then share safely with vendor support, forums, or any external system — no account, no upload, no third-party servers.

Install ScrubForge on Chrome →