# Why does my cumputer keep asking if I want to let these programs run? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [June 15, 2012, 1:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-my-cumputer-keep-asking-if-i-want-to-let-these-programs-run/625227 "2012-06-15T13:21:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 17\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![CastleAnthrax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ecd19e/32.png) [@CastleAnthrax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CastleAnthrax)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2012, 1:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-my-cumputer-keep-asking-if-i-want-to-let-these-programs-run/625227/1 "2012-06-15T13:21:21Z")
Every time I start my computer or change from my husband’s account to mine, I get one of two popups (never both). One is for BCIAgent, which is something that my LG phone put on the computer when I first connected them to share files, and one is for the wireless dongle thing I use to project stuff from my computer to my TV. The popup asks if it’s okay if this program makes changes to my computer. I installed both originally, so yeah, sure, but it comes up again regardless of whether I click yes or no this time. Neither of these is listed as a program when I search for them. How do I find them and convince them that they don’t need to keep asking? I’m concerned that something is installing a new copy every time or something. I’m using a Dell 1545 laptop with Windows 7. ---
**Author:** ![John\_DiFool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_difool/32/19543_2.png) [@John\_DiFool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_DiFool)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2012, 1:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-my-cumputer-keep-asking-if-i-want-to-let-these-programs-run/625227/2 "2012-06-15T13:35:52Z")
[I’ll leave it to the next poster to make an obvious joke on the typo in the title-too easy] ---
**Author:** ![Si\_Amigo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/si_amigo/32/2877_2.png) [@Si\_Amigo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Si_Amigo)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2012, 5:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-my-cumputer-keep-asking-if-i-want-to-let-these-programs-run/625227/3 "2012-06-15T17:29:44Z")
Oh cum on and answer the question! His computer obviously picked up a virus, most likely venereal in nature. ---
**Author:** ![rsat3acr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/a3d4f5/32.png) [@rsat3acr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rsat3acr)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2012, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-my-cumputer-keep-asking-if-i-want-to-let-these-programs-run/625227/4 "2012-06-15T17:33:34Z")
been looking at too much online porn. I think the op is a her not a him. ---
**Author:** ![Babale](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/babale/32/15666_2.png) [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2012, 5:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-my-cumputer-keep-asking-if-i-want-to-let-these-programs-run/625227/5 "2012-06-15T17:38:57Z")
> [@John\_DiFool](#): > > [I’ll leave it to the next poster to make an obvious joke on the typo in the title-too easy] But there’s so much potential for cumedy! Cum on, how can you resist? ---
**Author:** ![Blakeyrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ecd19e/32.png) [@Blakeyrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blakeyrat)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2012, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-my-cumputer-keep-asking-if-i-want-to-let-these-programs-run/625227/6 "2012-06-15T17:47:43Z")
It sounds to me like these two programs are badly-written, and weren’t tested in a multi-user environment, or in Windows 7, or in either. Which sucks. I’m not sure if you can fix this 100% short of “don’t use those programs”. What you could try doing is re-running each application’s installer (if you can find it!) while logged into your user account, and see if that takes care of the problem. Another possibility is to find the shortcut that launches them, and check the “run as Administrator” box in the Compatibility tab. This will get rid of those specific pop-ups, but you may need to give the app permission if you plug in your phone. Edit: Another alternative is to turn UAC off completely. I wouldn’t recommend this, as it reduces your protection against malware. Another Edit: Actually it just occurred to me you might be able to turn off UAC, plug in your phone and projector hardware and let the software run normally, then turn UAC back on. That might do it. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2012, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-my-cumputer-keep-asking-if-i-want-to-let-these-programs-run/625227/7 "2012-06-15T17:47:50Z")
It’s just a typo, people. The OP obviously meant to type compooter. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2012, 5:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-my-cumputer-keep-asking-if-i-want-to-let-these-programs-run/625227/8 "2012-06-15T17:49:47Z")
> [@](#): > > Every time I start my computer or change from my husband’s account to mine, I get one of two popups (never both). One is for BCIAgent, which is something that my LG phone put on the computer when I first connected them to share files, and one is for the wireless dongle thing I use to project stuff from my computer to my TV. The popup asks if it’s okay if this program makes changes to my computer. I installed both originally, so yeah, sure, but it comes up again regardless of whether I click yes or no this time. Neither of these is listed as a program when I search for them. Could be a virus or might be stub programs that were loaded using an administrator account, and your husbands account doesn’t have admin privileges. I’d check out the virus angle first though, as that’s more serious…if it’s just a stub program or some registry garbage still kicking around then it’s annoying by not threatening to the system. > [@](#): > > How do I find them and convince them that they don’t need to keep asking? I’m concerned that something is installing a new copy every time or something. I’m using a Dell 1545 laptop with Windows 7. If you don’t have one, get yourself an antivirus program and run that first on the system. Several times. If it comes back clean, then you could try to install the programs under your husbands account and see if that fixes the problem. If that doesn’t work then you will probably need a registry cleaning tool that can clean out those stub programs and other garbage in there. If there isn’t anything really important on the laptop, copy off your data files and blow it away…that will fix pretty much everything (that’s what I’d do in this case). -XT ---
**Author:** ![Bozuit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/edb3f5/32.png) [@Bozuit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bozuit)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2012, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-my-cumputer-keep-asking-if-i-want-to-let-these-programs-run/625227/9 "2012-06-15T17:51:40Z")
I doubt there’s much you can do, unless you want to turn off those prompts altogether, which is probably not a good idea. You could instead stop them starting automatically when you login (which is what I would do). If one is for your phone and the other is for using your TV with your computer I’d guess you can just open them when you need them, instead of having them open automatically every time (which will slow startup). If you want to do this, you can type “msconfig” in the search box of the Start menu. A window should come up. Go to the Startup tab, find the programs from the list and make sure they’re not selected. Then just press OK. If there’s anything else you’re sure you don’t need to start automatically you can deselect them too. A lot of programs are arrogant and assume you can’t live without them so they start automatically. ---
**Author:** ![Bozuit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/edb3f5/32.png) [@Bozuit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bozuit)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2012, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-my-cumputer-keep-asking-if-i-want-to-let-these-programs-run/625227/10 "2012-06-15T17:56:40Z")
> [@XT](#): > > Could be a virus or might be stub programs that were loaded using an administrator account, and your husbands account doesn’t have admin privileges. I’d check out the virus angle first though, as that’s more serious…if it’s just a stub program or some registry garbage still kicking around then it’s annoying by not threatening to the system. > > If you don’t have one, get yourself an antivirus program and run that first on the system. Several times. If it comes back clean, then you could try to install the programs under your husbands account and see if that fixes the problem. If that doesn’t work then you will probably need a registry cleaning tool that can clean out those stub programs and other garbage in there. If there isn’t anything really important on the laptop, copy off your data files and blow it away…that will fix pretty much everything (that’s what I’d do in this case). > > -XT I don’t think it’s anything to do with her husband’s account. She said it just happens whenever she logs into her account - presumably because they’re only on her account. There are plenty of programs that make these prompts come up because they want to do something Windows won’t allow without admin permission. I don’t see any reason to think it’s a virus. But yeah, definitely install an antivirus if you don’t have one. Avast! or AVG are free and good. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2012, 6:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-my-cumputer-keep-asking-if-i-want-to-let-these-programs-run/625227/11 "2012-06-15T18:00:57Z")
From the OP: > [@](#): > > Every time I start my computer or change from my husband’s account to mine, I get one of two popups (never both). I took this to mean they were using two different accounts, and that it’s only happening on one of them. I’ve seen that before on Windows. Assuming I’m interpreting this correctly, it might be that the program was loaded using admin creds, but that one of the other accounts doesn’t have those privileges. Or, that someone tried to uninstall it and THEY didn’t have the correct privileges. Or, that the program was a PoC and didn’t clean itself up after the install, and there is still registry junk in there causing this problem. I’m no systems guy, but I’ve seen this sort of thing happen before, again assuming I’m understanding the OPs problem here. Normally I wouldn’t recommend someone who doesn’t know what they are doing play with MSCONFIG, but you walked her through pretty well and that’s a good idea. Certainly she should get a decent AV program if she doesn’t have one. -XT ---
**Author:** ![Bozuit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/edb3f5/32.png) [@Bozuit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bozuit)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2012, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-my-cumputer-keep-asking-if-i-want-to-let-these-programs-run/625227/12 "2012-06-15T18:18:01Z")
Yeah I agree about msconfig, but you’ve gotta learn sometime 😛 My Windows 7 account is an admin account but a few programs still ask for that permission. That makes me think another possibility may be that they’re set to “Run as administrator”. **HennaDancer** if you can find the files that are asking for permission you could try right clicking on them, going to Properties and the Compatibility tab and making sure “Run this program as administrator” is not selected. I don’t know exactly where the files will be, but they’re most likely in Program Files or Program Files (x86) then a folder with the name of the program or the developer. So for the LG one it’s probably something like C:\Program Files\LG rubbish\bciagent.exe. Or if you have shortcuts to those programs anywhere you can right click them and go to “Open file location”. Chances are that’s not the issue, though. It’s just a thought. ---
**Author:** ![Blakeyrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ecd19e/32.png) [@Blakeyrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blakeyrat)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2012, 6:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-my-cumputer-keep-asking-if-i-want-to-let-these-programs-run/625227/13 "2012-06-15T18:29:44Z")
> [@XT](#): > > I took this to mean they were using two different accounts, and that it’s only happening on one of them. I’ve seen that before on Windows. Assuming I’m interpreting this correctly, it might be that the program was loaded using admin creds, but that one of the other accounts doesn’t have those privileges. Or, that someone tried to uninstall it and THEY didn’t have the correct privileges. Or, that the program was a PoC and didn’t clean itself up after the install, and there is still registry junk in there causing this problem. > > I’m no systems guy, but I’ve seen this sort of thing happen before, again assuming I’m understanding the OPs problem here. Normally I wouldn’t recommend someone who doesn’t know what they are doing play with MSCONFIG, but you walked her through pretty well and that’s a good idea. Certainly she should get a decent AV program if she doesn’t have one. The problem from my experience is that the program’s installer will install something on the system (“all users”/whatever it’s called now) account that refers to something in a particular user’s account. For example, it might have a registry key that refers to the husband’s user profile folder, but that key is located in the system configuration. When you log on to an account without access to the husband’s folder, Windows has to fudge the directory to make the program work. That’s just an example, there are other ways an installer can screw this up. The cause, unfortunately, is simply that the software is buggy and wasn’t tested well. There’s not much you as an end-user can do about that. It’s shocking how many Windows developers know approximately nothing about the features of Windows, and think it’s ok to test their software on a single computer with a single user account. ---
**Author:** ![Kinthalis](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kinthalis/32/16084_2.png) [@Kinthalis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kinthalis)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2012, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-my-cumputer-keep-asking-if-i-want-to-let-these-programs-run/625227/14 "2012-06-15T19:44:57Z")
Is this an older program maybe? The issue sometimes comes up with older programs that do not handle permissions in a modern OS window correctly and require constant elevation in order to function correctly. Other than trying one of the compatibility options in windows 7, there’s nothing much you can do short of asking the developer to get with the times. Alternatively it might be a program that genuinely requires elevated status to access some sort of protected system resource. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2012, 8:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-my-cumputer-keep-asking-if-i-want-to-let-these-programs-run/625227/15 "2012-06-16T08:08:54Z")
> [@Kinthalis](#): > > Alternatively it might be a program that genuinely requires elevated status to access some sort of protected system resource. That would still mean that it’s poorly written, as there are ways to deal with that. You don’t want a program that runs on startup to run as administrator, because UAC makes it always use a prompt. If you need admin level access, you install a service that can give that access. If you also want a user-level interface, you write a user program that can interface with the admin service. And, yes, I’d suggest reinstalling the programs under the problematic account. If the problem is that the software is written to only work on single account systems, this may allow it to be installed on both accounts. ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2012, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-my-cumputer-keep-asking-if-i-want-to-let-these-programs-run/625227/16 "2012-06-16T16:42:14Z")
> [@](#): > > **Why does my cumputer keep asking if I want to let these programs run?** I knew most people used them for porn, but I didn’t know this had actually led to them being renamed. ---
**Author:** ![CastleAnthrax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ecd19e/32.png) [@CastleAnthrax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CastleAnthrax)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2012, 1:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-my-cumputer-keep-asking-if-i-want-to-let-these-programs-run/625227/17 "2012-06-18T01:47:52Z")
Hey, I never said what I was using the computer for. Could be a cumputer. Irrelevant to the question. I would try uninstall and reinstall, except I can’t ind the programs. Search comes up empty.