I found out that it will not delete the controls inside of the placeholder, provided I DO NOT assign the controls a unique id. This functionality is... strange at best. But I guess a part of learning a solution is becoming familiar with its quarks.

Try this: `<location path="YOUR_FILE_NAME.aspx"> <system.web> <authorization> <deny users="?"/> </authorization> </system.web> </location>`

Thanks, I took a very quick glance at web services, and it looks to be just what I need. I appreciate the quick response! I'll go bury my nose in tutorials and documentation, and hopefully I'll have a working solution soon.