Microsoft Security Essentials: How to Disable the 'Real Time Protection Is Off' Warning?

"You can disable it by removing msseces.exe from HKLM's CurrentVersion\Run key; easily done with Autoruns. The scheduled scan is a task that runs a separate process.

(I'm being deliberately vague about how exactly to disable it to avoid corruption of the innocent.)

Update: Killing the process msseces.exe removes the tray-icon, no matter what state the program is in right now. MsMpEng.exe is the binary that does the real work (and it is called the same on Windows8 as well)."

"I don't have MSE installed here, so I can't test this, but when you go to the ""hide inactive icons"" then click customize, do you get a different entry for mse for when real-time protection is disabled, than for when it is enable or other errors?

You might be able to hide just the one you want."