C# How to store password in application

Question

I am trying to write an app, that will be scheduled to autodownload one page from a Sharepoint server every hour. It is an xml file. Everything works so far, except I do not like storing the password needed to connect to Sharepoint in plaintext in my app. Sample code here:

WebClient client = new WebClient();
String username = "myusername";
String password = "mypassword"
String filename = "C:\\Temp\\" + DateTime.Now.ToString("yyyyMMddHHmmssffff") + ".xml";

client.Credentials = new System.Net.NetworkCredential(username, password);
string credentials =  Convert.ToBase64String(Encoding.ASCII.GetBytes(username + ":" + password));
client.DownloadFile("myurl", filename);

Is there a way how to make it harder to read my password if someone got the executabe file from my server and disassembled it e.g. with Reflector?
I have found this: How to store passwords in Winforms application? but I did not really figure out how to use it in my app.

Answer 1

In fact you'd better not use passwords. If the service runs under the right credentials, you can use that one by using the DefaultNetworkCredentials:

So in your sample:

client.Credentials = CredentialCache.DefaultNetworkCredentials;

This will get you the credentials of the current network user, like DOMAIN\USER.

Answer 2

If you must store the password with the app, put it in the config file and then encrypt the appropriate section(s) of that using Protected Configuration.