Windows – How to Remove UAC Icon Overlays (Blue-Yellow Shields) in Windows 7

iconsuacwindows 7

Over some of my program shortcuts and install files, there is an uac icon overlay (blue-yellow shield) and I find them really ugly. Is there any way to get rid of them please?

Edit

I closed UAC to see if overlays go away or not. Now it's open. But maybe there is a way to remove them without closing the UAC like removing shortcut arrows in this question: Remove shortcut icon overlay from shortcuts on Windows 7

Best Answer

After days of trying various methods, I believe I've found the ultimate solution to remove that annoying shield icon; it's not difficult and works perfectly for me.

The following procedure removes the shield overlay only from icons and Start Menu items, but will not be removed from Control Panel applets and context menus.

  1. Disable UAC [User Account Control] by moving its slider to the lowest position
  2. Open Command Prompt (you'll find it in the Start Menu)
  3. Execute the following, pressing Enter after each line: 
    TaskKill /IM "Explorer.exe" /F
Cd /D "%LocalAppData%"
Del "IconCache.db" /A
Shutdown /R
    • Last command will restart the computer, so ensure you save your work before executing
    • If experiencing the shield icon again, execute the above again
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