Opinion: Windows 7's UAC is a broken mess; mend it or end it - Ars Technica

Opinion: Windows 7's UAC is a broken mess; mend it or end it

The changes Microsoft has made to Windows 7's UAC render it little more than a pesky annoyance. If this is the path the company wishes to go down, it should stop doing things by halves and kill it off altogether.

By Peter Bright | Last updated March 4, 2009 11:31 PM CT

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I wrote a few weeks ago about changes Microsoft has made to Windows 7's User Account Control (UAC) that make the component less secure than it was in Vista. Though the company has responded by saying it will change some of the problem behaviors, yet more problems have emerged that indicate that a real fix will be harder than first expected. But more than that, the flaws call into question the entire purpose of the Windows UAC feature, at least in its commonplace "Admin Approval" mode.

The decisions Microsoft has made not only make Windows 7's Admin Approval mode less secure than Vista's, they also undermine the entire purpose of the UAC system. Redmond maintains that UAC's foremost objective is to ensure programmers update their programs to behave properly when users have limited access rights. But the way that the Windows 7 UAC "improvements" have been made completely exempts Microsoft's developers from having to do that work themselves. With Windows 7, it's one rule for Redmond, another one for everyone else.

The combination of significant security flaws and the inconsistent, "Do as I say, not as I do" attitude towards UAC should give Microsoft pause for thought. There's no point in retaining Admin Approval mode as it currently stands, and it should be scrapped completely.

I think UAC is a pointless, and gets in the way, i disable it on the one machine i run using vista.

Originally Posted by homesick

I think UAC is a pointless, and gets in the way, i disable it on the one machine i run using vista.

If you understand the argument for UAC then you might think otherwise. The claim is that when running an account with administrative rights all of the time if you where to happen to get malware it would be allowed to run unless anti-malware stopped it. When not running an administrative account by default and/or using UAC the malware program wouldn't initially be able to run unless you gave it permission to install itself. The safe alternative is to run as a "standard user" most of the time and logging into an administrative account only when needing to perform administrative tasks such as installing updates, installing programs, etc. In that case the advantage is still to have UAC on because Vista will prompt you for a password to run administrative tasks and you won't have to actually log into an administrative account. If you have UAC on and run an administrator account all of the time then if malware where to try to run on your computer then Vista would stop it from running and ask you for permission to allow it to run. You could then forbid it from running and you wouldn't have any problem with the program because it was prevented from installing.

As for how this applies to Win 7 is questionable.

Never used UAC, and never will.
This is a false security, or worthless, in my opinion.
Why?
It pisses off computer savvy people, and people, who are not computer savvy, in most cases, click OK anyway, so what's the use of it...

Originally Posted by broni

Never used UAC, and never will.
This is a false security, or worthless, in my opinion.
Why?
It pisses off computer savvy people, and people, who are not computer savvy, in most cases, click OK anyway, so what's the use of it...

I don't use an admin account usually so I have it and don't mind it. I guess its just preference.

Sure thing

UAC or nag screen

Well everyone is entitled to their own opinion. Personally I think that is a good idea.