is it bad to turn off user account control?

**Sigh**... This is going too far, for those who want complete bulletproof computing, go use the "Guest" account, that will give you complete bulletproof computing.

zzz2496

zzz2496 said:

It's better to use a real limited user account than to use a crippled admin account with lots and lots of UAC checkpoints.

It's just too bad that the average user is never going to go through that hassle. Thus, we have UAC which is a nice medium to fit a more typical Windows user.

Tepid said:

The simple fact is,, UAC can and does prevent programs from running that require Admin rights.
Plain and simple,, stupid idea or not, it's a fact. You have said it yourself that, that is what it does.

So, to get back on full topic of,,,,
Should anyone turn off UAC or not?

As it works the way it is intended and it does work.
The answer is No, you should not.

What one does in reality is their own business. And not my problem, till they start complaining about getting infected or having other issues and you find out that it might have been preventable, but they disabled a tool that could have saved them the grief in the long run. My answer will always be,, plain and simple, because it does what it is supposed to do,, run as standard user with UAC enabled. Is it the best perfect all around wonderful god like utility that we hope and wish it would be? No. But, it's not a useless tool either as long as people pay attention to why it is popping.

This is a controversy that will go down in the annals of all that is MS, just as activating XP did back in the day, just as Run with no page file or what, still is today (even though it's has been proven time and again that it is best to run with MS recommended page file sizes regardless of how much ram you have installed).

So, why do I say run with UAC is my standard answer?

Because, I know people, and the largest majority of people asking this question, do not know what they are really doing, are not really all that safe of surfers or stewards of their own security. I also am not here to tell anyone how to run their own system or protect them from themselves. That's not my intention, nor my job, and frankly speaking, I don't want anyone forcing it on me. But, we also all (as techs, or more experienced users) provide the (not sure how to put this) ,, best answers, not always as we ourselves run our system but how a system is intended to run, to the best of our knowledge. Giving security advice that works for us, is not something that always works for everyone else. Spitting out some of the answers I have seen in this thread, many are well, irresponsible. Bad Advice.

Putting even more simply, and which may become my standard answer to this particular question is...

Q. Should one turn off UAC or not?

A. If you have to ask that question, then No, you Should not turn off UAC.

Actually, I'll make that part of my sig.

Nice post...I wanted to give you rep but I cannot at this point until i give others Rep.

Tepid said:

This is the exact reason why I state, use Standard User with UAC enabled.
Far better protection in my opinion. And the way Win 7 is meant to be used.

I might just try going this route for a while on a box at work and see how things work out.

zzz2496 said:

**Sigh**for those who want complete bulletproof computing,

For those people, just turn off your computers and find another hobby. Regardless of what you use and how you use it...there is no such thing as "bulletproff" where software and user interaction is intertwined.

pparks1 said:

...For those people, just turn off your computers and find another hobby. Regardless of what you use and how you use it...there is no such thing as "bulletproff" where software and user interaction is intertwined.

Ahh, yes... The on/off switch is the best solution for bulletproof computing...
... Particularly when it's on "OFF" position...

zzz2496

malexous said:

zzz2496 said:

**Sigh**... This is going too far, for those who want complete bulletproof computing, go use the "Guest" account, that will give you complete bulletproof computing.

zzz2496

Not according to Marco Giuliani. Is Limited User Account enough? Not really...

This dirty job can be done even from a guest account; even from there it is possible to intercept and log keystrokes.

If you read that blog post, you should've understand that yes, the malware can still capture your keystrokes, BUT ONLY your keystrokes. If your wife logged in using her own user, her account won't have that nasty keylogger...

You should understand by now that LUA and Guest account can indeed limit the damage the malware/virus might cause. But in the case of Guest, you can set Windows to delete Guest account's account content upon log off (or was it not to save anything? I forgot), the point is, using Guest won't save anything...
Just like using browser in anonymous mode (dump or reject every cookie it receives).

As I said earlier, even IF you got an infection, the infection will run amok in your particular user ONLY. It won't be able to "destroy" Windows because it's running as a Limited user, your limited user account. It can't do anything as far as system destruction... Your files (documents, music, movies) might get "hit" by it, but you do have a backup of those files, right? It's much much muuuuch safer than using UAC IMHO. In a sense, yes you might caught an infection, but the infection is only affecting your limited user, and can't/won't be able to install a global service.

Again...

Here's the difference, let's say you got a keylogger installed (a malware) in your account. That keylogger will always run when you login, when your wife login (using her own LUA), her profile won't have that nasty keylogger... That is MUCH SAFER than you voluntarily clicked the UAC "OK" button because you need some crack to run some illegitimate app, and got your whole computer taken over (with LUA, only your user is hijacked, the system is safe).

I repeat, LUA + UAC = moot. As for security products (MSE, Avast, etc), it's common sense to use them in ANY KIND of Windows installation...

zzz2496

At the end, be careful: a standard LUA is really useful to avoid pc infections, but it is not enough by itself.