If after the computer is setup you are constantly seeing UAC prompts you are
doing something wrong. I hardly ever see a UAC prompt.

While getting at financial information and identity theft is the goal of
some malware it is not the goal of most current malware. Most current
malware has the goal of extortion (e.g. spysherrif) or the goal of taking
control of your computer to use it as a zombie. The extortion malware is
very obvious when you get it. The trojans that take over your computer for
use as a zombie are not. The fact that many hundreds of thousands of
computers are available for sale as part of a botnet attests to the fact
that you cannot secure XP (or any OS) if you run as an administrator. I see
many computers that have up to date antivirus and antispyware software that
are compromised in this fashion. UAC (or running XP as a standard user)
would have stopped these infections. Turning off UAC may relieve some short
term pain but it won't cure the disease and may have the opposite effect of
helping to spread the disease.

--
Kerry Brown
Microsoft MVP - Shell/User
http://www.vistahelp.ca


"JD Wohlever" wrote in message
...
I hate to say so MS, but your average joe, the person you are making UAC
for, is going
to do exactly what they are doing, that is turning UAC off.
Example, my mother is your basic Internet User. She just graduated from
AOL to
a normal broadband connection after me telling her for years how much
better broadband would be for her. She bought a PC that had Vista Home
Premium on it.
Suddenly dial-up became a major pain in the butt because Vista is geared
more toward a constant net connection. No problem there, I agree.
However, 2 days later she calls me up and asks me to put Windows XP back
on her computer.
When I ask her why, the response " I'm sick of the computer asking me
questions every 5 seconds. It didn't do it before. I have an anti-virus, a
firewall, and a anti-spyware program running. Why do I have to OK every
single thing I do?"
I tried explaining the benefits, but she would hear none of it. She has
been told by the Norton's and the AdAware's of the world that as long as
she runs their programs and practices safe netting that she is ok. So it
was either turn UAC off or install Windows XP for her, she was that
serious.
And to be honest, I understand how she feels. In 5 years she has never had
a virus, has only had very light malware (Which SpyBot SD quickly
removed), and has nothing of hi-value on her PC for a hacker to have much
interest in other than family photo's of the dog etc.
My point being is that the average user who buys Windows HOME versions are
not going to WANT this elevated security, and as soon as they find a way
to remove it, they will.
MS should have made UAC a Business / Enterprise feature and left the
standard user and admin feature set of XP for the Home licenses of Vista.
I build PC's for a living so I know the problems that John Q Public can
make for their selves on a PC on the net with no protection. But simple
education and running the big 3 (Anti-virus, Anti-spyware and Firewalls)
should be more than enough to protect them. Now if they are stupid enough
to store all their financial information or work related trade secrets and
not have the "the big 3" then they certainly aren't going to tolerate UAC.



--
Thank you,
JD Wohlever

Techware Grafx
techware(dash)grafx(at)hotmail(dot)com

"Kerry Brown" *a*m wrote in message
...
There is some pain associated with UAC. Jimmy Brush's post explains it
very well. I'll add a bit of history as to how we got to UAC and why it's
needed.

There were two families of Windows, NT based (Windows NT) and DOS based
(Windows 95). NT was mostly used in business networks and had excellent
security. Everyone ran as a standard user and only used administrator
accounts for things like installing programs, maintenance etc. Win95
really had no security as it was based on DOS and all users had total
control of the system at all times. Windows 95 became very popular and
many programs were written for it. Microsoft published guidelines on how
to program using established APIs and recommended programmers use this
method. Because the hardware at the time was limited, programming through
the documented APIs made for slow programs. Most programmers including
those at Microsoft, ignored the APIs and basically did what they had to
to get their programs running at the speed end users expected. This is
where most current programmers got their start and learned their habits.
As time progressed the DOS based versions of Windows were abandoned and
the NT and DOS world merged in XP which is NT based. All the end users
and programmers from the DOS world didn't change their ways. End users
ran as administrators all the time and programmers bypassed the APIs and
expected the users to be running as administrators. Around this time the
Internet exploded. Malware became a major problem exacerbated by the way
programmers and end users were using Windows. There was no way to secure
XP given this situation. Microsoft decided to write a new more secure OS.
There is a lot of changes under the hood but in the end the best security
is to enforce programmers to use the APIs and not have end users running
as administrators. Unfortunately this would break almost all existing
software. Thus we have UAC. It allows most old programs to do what they
do and tricks them into thinking it worked. It also allows users to run
as an administrator but gives them a warning when those administrator
privileges are going to be used.

--
Kerry Brown
Microsoft MVP - Shell/User
http://www.vistahelp.ca


"alex" wrote in message
...

Hi Kerry,

Here's the problem with Vistas security as I see it.

I am a long time Windows user with, at best, an intermediate knowledge
of
how programs work and how they're supposed to work with computers.

Whenever Windows prompts me for confirmation regarding a security issue,
to
be honest, at times, I haven't the slightest clue whether I should allow
or
cancel something.

Other than the most obvious "A program is trying to destroy your
hard-drive
and clean out your bank account" message, I'm likely going to let the
program
do what it wants to do.

I minimize my exposure to to malware by not downloading software or
opening
e-mail attachments with which I'm not familiar. But sometimes I visit
CNN.com or MSN or something as seemingly benign and I'm told that an
update
has to be performed and I'm asked if I trust the source.

No, I don't trust the source. But if I'm going want to visit those
sites I
have to allow changes to be made.

The UAC just annoys me and actually puts me in the habit of just
clicking
"continue" without reading what the window says.

Ehhh. Personal preference I guess.

BTW: This reminds me of how Microsoft didn't give the user the ability
to
download attachments in Outlook in Office XP (I think it was XP). What
a
pain-in-the-a@@ that was.


"Kerry Brown" wrote:

Disabling UAC disables much of the improved security in Vista. Once you
have
your computer set up as you want it, it is recommended to turn UAC back
on.
You can do everything you always did with UAC on you just have to do it
in a
new way. UAC actually gives you more control as you now know when a
program
is about to do something that may affect the whole system. This is the
price
of security.

--
Kerry Brown
Microsoft MVP - Shell/User
http://www.vistahelp.ca


"alex" wrote in message
...
Never mind. I found the UAC options.

"alex" wrote:

How may I disable all the prompts that appear whenever I try to do
something
like uninstall a program or delete a file or directory?

Vista Premium

Thanks,
Alex