If you're concerned about keeping critical information in your Web.config file, then you should encrypt it -- or at least the parts that you're concerned about.

These files include machine.config and web.config. The web.config file is application-specific and is created by default when you create a web application or a web site in Visual Studio.

More than six years ago, Chuck Fields asked Microsoft for better Web.config-style Transform support, an idea seconded by more than 8,800 fellow developers on the UserVoice site used by Microsoft to ...