Regarding Adobe Reader; try disabling Protected Mode [Edit | Preferences | Security (Enhanced)].
But you cannot open Reader long enough to make that change; download, unzip, then run the registry script from https://files.acrobat.com/a/preview/69a1cb57-0ef4-4e7a-ac43-e2d6119db661 (for Reader XI).
There may be similar settings in Acrobat, but I have never experimented with these.