The credential policy determines whether to send credentials when sending a request for a network resource, such as the content of a Web page. If credentials are sent, servers that require client authentication can attempt to authenticate the client when the request is received instead of sending a response indicating that the client's credentials are required. While this saves a round trip to the server, this must be balanced against the security risk inherent in sending credentials across the network. When the destination server does not require client authentication it is best to not send credentials.

The credential policy will be called only for requests that specify credentials or use a System.Net.WebProxy object that specifies credentials.