Important Changes to Fing Desktop: Client ID and Network Assignment

Updated February 20, 2026 09:27

Fing Dev Team

What's Changing

We're rolling out updates to Fing systems, servers, and applications that include a key change to how desktop installations work. Going forward, each Fing Desktop installation (identified by its Client ID) linked to your user account will be assigned to a specific network when the network monitoring status is active.

However, it has important implications if you use virtual machines (VMs) to deploy Fing Desktop across multiple computers or networks.

How This Affects Virtual Machine Deployments

Many professional and power users deploy virtual machines by cloning a preconfigured image across multiple PCs. While this is a common and efficient IT practice in general, it creates a problem with Fing Desktop.

When you clone a VM image that contains a Fing Desktop installation, the Client ID is duplicated along with it. Under the new system, that single Client ID can only be activated on one network. This means cloned instances of the same installation will not be able to operate on different networks, leading to activation conflicts.

Why We Advise Against Cloning Fing Desktop via VM Images

Duplicate Client IDs — Every cloned VM carries the same Client ID, which the Fing platform now treats as a single installation tied to one network.
Activation failures — Attempting to activate the same Client ID on a second network will fail.

For these reasons, we strongly recommend against deploying Fing Desktop through cloned virtual machine images.

Recommended Approach

If you need Fing Desktop running on multiple machines or networks, please follow these guidelines:

MacOS guidelines

Logout from the Fing Desktop App
Close the Fing Desktop App
Delete the file /Users/root/.fingagent/conf/fingagent
Stop the Fing agent service by opening the terminal and entering the following
```
sudo launchctl unload /Library/LaunchDaemons/com.fing.service.plist
```
In the same terminal start the Fing agent service by entering the following
```
sudo launchctl load /Library/LaunchDaemons/com.fing.service.plist
```
Open the Fing Desktop app and login again

Windows guidelines

Logout from the Fing Desktop App
Close the Fing Desktop App
Delete the file C:\%userprofile%\AppData\Roaming\FingAgent\conf\fingagent
Stop the Fing agent service by opening the command prompt as administrator and entering the following command
```
sc stop fing.agent
```
In the same prompt start the Fing agent service by entering the following
```
sc start fing.agent
```
Open the Fing Desktop app and login again

After the login the Fing Desktop will assign a new clientId to your Virtual Machine, without having any conflicts with your multiple installation of Fing Desktop.