The "without the user's consent" part says it all. You should warn the user on first launch (via a dialog), and tell them they can change the setting any time. The dialog should have both "allow background process" and "disallow background process" options. Right now, the user has to figure it out on his own (via Preferences... I guess) and the helper is covertly launched by default; that's the problem I think.
Additionally, you could add the typical "ask me everytime" checkbox at the bottom of the dialog.