As he explained in his , UAC's default setting in Windows 7 is to “Notify me only when programs try to make changes to my computer” and “Don’t notify me when I make changes to Windows settings."

UAC distinguishes between a third-party program and a Windows setting with a security certification, and control-panel items are signed with this certificate so they don't issue prompts if a user changes system settings, he wrote.

However, in Windows 7, changing UAC is considered a "change to Windows settings," according to Zheng. This, coupled with the new default UAC security level, means a user will not be prompted if changes are made to UAC, including if it was disabled.

With a few keyboard shortcuts and some code, Zheng said he can disable UAC remotely without the end-user knowing.

"With the help of my developer side-kick Rafael Rivera, we came up with a fully functional proof-of-concept in VBScript (would be just as easy in C++ EXE) to do that -- emulate a few keyboard inputs -- without prompting UAC," he wrote. "You can download and try it out for yourself here, but bear in mind it actually does disable UAC."