Your code has secrets.
Don't hand them to AI.

Credential Scrubber finds hardcoded passwords, API keys, and connection strings in your code, and masks them — before you paste anything into an AI chat, a ticket, or a pull request.

Scanning runs on your device. Your files are never uploaded.

How a secret actually leaks

It happens faster than you'd think — and it only takes once.

code editor 🤔💬
"This bug is weird... let me ask AI for help."
spring.datasource.url= username=admin password=Sup3rSecret! port=5432 ⚠️
That password is sitting right there in plain text.
password= Sup3r! 💬 NO UNDO
Pasted straight into the AI chat. Gone — no undo.
Credential Scrubber catches it first — before it ever leaves your machine.
spring.datasource.url= username=admin port=5432
The secret is masked. The rest of the code is untouched.
🎉 ✨
Ready to share. Crisis averted.

Why this actually matters

A hardcoded credential can end up somewhere you don't expect — and the cost of that can be high.

Without scanning first

  • A pasted API key can be used by anyone who later sees that conversation — whether through a log, a screenshot, or a shared chat history
  • Cloud credentials (AWS, GCP, Azure) can rack up real charges in someone else's hands
  • A leaked database password can open the door to every record inside it
  • Once shared, a secret can't be "un-shared" — rotating it after the fact is the only fix, and only if you notice in time

With Credential Scrubber

  • Hardcoded secrets it recognizes are masked before they leave your machine. It's a safety net, not a guarantee, so skim the results before you share.
  • Works the same whether you're pasting into an AI chat, a support ticket, or a public repo
  • Your files are never uploaded. Scanning happens on your own device.
  • Free, open-source, and fast enough to run before every share — not just once a year

Two ways to use it

Same detection engine underneath. Pick whichever fits how you work.

Online — no install

Open it in your browser, drop in a folder, get a cleaned copy back. Everything happens on your own device using your browser's own file access — nothing is ever uploaded to a server, even though there's nothing to install.

Try it now

Downloadable app

A full desktop app for Windows: manage multiple projects, track scan history over time, edit detection rules, and scan only what changed since your last commit.

Download

Does sanitized code still work for an AI coding agent?

Masking a secret is only useful if the AI can still do its job without it. So we ran a controlled experiment: the same AI coding agent, given the same files, once with the real values and once with the sanitized version — then scored by hand to see if anything was lost.

9
source files
6
task types
48
paired comparisons
96
AI responses

What we found

Across 48 matched comparisons, most of what we measured held up. Correctness and consistency were essentially unchanged between the two versions. Usefulness showed a statistically distinguishable difference in a minority of cases — 7 of 48 pairs — concentrated in two kinds of tasks (generating tests and suggesting refactors), where the sanitized version scored lower. Completeness showed a similar, smaller pattern that didn't clear our significance threshold. We also ran a control where the "sanitized" file was byte-identical to the original — and one of its pairs still changed, which tells us some of this variation comes from the AI itself, not just from sanitization. Across all 96 responses, we found zero cases of the AI merging two different secrets together, splitting one secret into two, reconstructing a real value, or generating code that wouldn't run because of a placeholder.

What we didn't test

This is one evaluation pass, on one AI model, over 9 hand-picked files — not a large study, and not a claim that this works the same way for every model, every codebase, or every kind of secret. It doesn't test resistance to a malicious AI agent, and it doesn't prove sanitization caused every difference we saw — see the control above. We're publishing the full methodology and every score so you can check our work.

Read the full evaluation →

How it keeps you safe

Get started

Use it online now Download for Windows (.exe)