If Cisco has offered a free software update to address a specific issue, noncontract customers who are eligible for the update may obtain it by contacting the Cisco TAC using any of the means described in the General Security-Related Queries section of this document. Free software updates will typically be limited to Cisco Security Advisories.
Refer to the Cisco security publication for details. The decision to provide free software updates is made on a case-by-case basis. “ As a special customer service, and to improve the overall security of the Internet, Cisco may offer customers free software updates to address high-severity security problems. What most people don’t know is that Cisco has a security vulnerability policy that states:
Ignoring how ridiculous it is for a hardware vendor to require continual payments to receive software fixes, let’s look at how to obtain cisco IOS update software without a valid support contract. A few years ago Cisco walled off their update downloads, requiring that you have a current SMARTnet subscription (be under a support contract) to download them.
