If you have already read our previous articles on Windows UAC, you have learnt this is the systems’ user account control. This time, let’s now look at how all of these mightiness of the UAC works.
UAC on the administrator account
As for the administrator account, a simple pop up box would appear asking the user like “Do you want to allow this app to make changes to your device?” and with yes or no button. All of the UAC options always come in with shield icon appearing left or right of the options. For instance, if you are in the control panel > install or uninstall a programme, you will see an option says ‘Turn on or off Windows feature’ and will see a shield icon to the left of the option. This icon can appear on any programs installed as administrator as well.
The best thing about this is, this will always let the user know that they are about to perform a serious task. While this does provide a heavy security, people of VISTA users found it so disturbing that they straight figured out how to shut down this feature all in all. The thing is, it is nearly impossible to totally shut down this feature but he level of UAC it can perform can be controlled.
UAC levels on Windows
To get to this option, simply go ahead and type change user account control settings in the search bar, in the Windows task bar to get there. This way show here is for the most modern Windows like Windows 10. However, you can always manually go to this applet by looking for control panel and getting to Change User Account Control. When you are there, you will see a slide and their associate four security levels.
The top most level says ‘Always Notify me’ meaning anytime you want to make any changes in your Windows system will bring back the good old UAC from Vista. This is highest level of security you can implement with this top level.
The next two levels are, ‘Notify me only when apps/programs try to make changes to my computer’ and ‘Don’t notify me’ when I make changes to the Windows settings. The bottom most level which says ‘Never Notify me’ simply turns this feature off. Most of these are pretty self-explanatory. By Default, Windows comes in the second level of always notifying. If you are going to play around with the level to suit your needs, make sure you fully understand what each of these level do and the potential consequences of these settings.
The differences in the dialogue boxes
One of the most common questions that may arise when you are playing around with this is, what exactly is the difference between when a program make changes and the changes you make? Let’s clear this out. When you are downloading and about to install something from the Internet, a dialogue box will appear saying that ‘Do you want to allow this app to make changes to this computer?”, this is to say that the program is going to get installed and if the program has your consent.
Often this dialogue boxes will come in with some good indication of the legitimacy of the program. This is indicated so by colours of the dialogue box. The blue ones are usually verified program by Microsoft, Yellow ones are the non-verified and the red ones are the most malicious ones and you do not want authorise such applications, doing so may invite the potential threat to your system or files. You will also notice the shield in the dialogue box. If you notice such shield in the dialogue box, this indicates that this decision requires administrator privilege.
The lower level
As for the promisingly secured and annoying part if you raise the security level up to the top, not only this box will appear to let you decide between yes or no but also will reassure if you click one of these button. So it will go like, “You sure want to approve this?” if you press yes, it will prompt “Are you 100% sure though?”. The whole security level in the top somewhat works like this.
Now as for the bottom most security level, if you set there, you will never be notified of anything and the program will simply make changes to your system without having you to decide if you want it to make changes or not. But not, this not going to happen if you do not have the administrator privilege.
For the non-administrator or standard users, you will still be prompted with a dialogue box requiring administrator password.
With these, you are good to adjust your security levels to your need ensuring total safety or no safety for your PC at all.