User Account Control (UAC) is Not a Security Tool

The single most irritating feature introduced in Windows Vista was those annoying UAC prompts, asking you for permission to do nearly anything on your computer—and the fact is, even if it makes you feel more secure, it's a false sense of security. Malware researchers at Sophos Labs found that 8 of 10 malware samples can actually bypass UAC on a system with the default Windows 7 settings.

The fact of the matter is that unless you've pushed the UAC slider all the way to the top [Windows 7], It's not meant to be a security feature.

The original intent was to change the way Windows works so that you can more easily run software as a standard user account, instead of running as administrator all the time.

So there you have it—if you aren't going to run as a standard user or turn the slider all the way to the top, you may as well disable UAC.

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