Microsoft announced yesterday its plans to change the way a controversial security feature works in Windows 7. The software responded to a Vista problem and decided to make the Windows 7 prompt users to make changes less frequently.

However, this may come at a cost. Numerous industry experts said that this change may increase the risk level in users of Windows 7. Microsoft’s Windows Vista popped up a warning any time a major change was being made to the system, but with the new OS, users will be able to choose how often to be notified.

Although at first Microsoft downplayed the rumors about the security risks, on Thursday it announced it has addressed a security problem affecting the User Account Control (UAC) feature in Windows 7.

The issue of high risk involving the UAC feature was brought forward to Microsoft by the bloggers Long Zheng and Rafael Rivera, who said the vulnerability could be exploited by hackers by tricking Windows 7 into granting malicious codes authorized rights to users’ machines.

Microsoft said it won’t change the default setting, but will add an exception when changes are being made to the UAC itself. The changes made to the UAC will require user approval, said Microsoft VPs Jon DeVaan and Steven Sinofsky in a blog post.

"First, the UAC control panel will run in a high integrity process, which requires elevation. That was already in the works before this discussion...Second, changing the level of the UAC will also prompt for confirmation," the two vice presidents wrote.