Data Privacy and Encryption

Question

Can any person or system at Microsoft read or in any way access or analyze my data or activity or usage of Office 365 or OneDrive?  If so, what can they do with it?

Answer 1

Yup, MS calles "telemetry", both in Windows and Office.  Cynics call it "spyware".

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2019 04 29- Connected experiences in Office- Telemetry Office 365

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/deployoffice/privacy/connected-experiences#connected-experiences-that-download-online-content

The information in this article applies to Version 1904 or later of the following Office client software installed on a computer running Windows:

·             Office 365 ProPlus and Office 365 Business

·             Office 365 Personal, Office 365 Home, or other versions of Office that are part of an Office 365 subscription.

·             Project and Visio that come with some subscription plans, such as the Project Online Professional plan or Visio Online Plan 2.

.  *  Connected experiences that analyze your content

.  * Connected experiences that download online content

.  *  Other connected experiences

.  *  Choose whether these connected experiences are available to use

Telemetry - Office 2013 for IT pros – Technet Home Page

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-US/office

https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/jj863580.aspx - Overview of Office Telemetry

New<br> Office telemetry poster and compatibility guide in the Office 2013 Resource Kit<br> <br><br>We’ve published a new Visio poster and article about compatibility and telemetry in Office 2013.<br><br><br><br>Office 2013 Resource Kit<br> <br><br>Find information in the Office Resource Kit about new features and changes in deployment strategies for Office 2013.<br><br><br><br>Quickly<br> set up Office Telemetry Dashboard on a workgroup or domain-joined computer<br> <br><br>Learn how to use a Windows PowerShell script to quickly set up Telemetry Dashboard on a single computer.<br><br><br><br>The new Office Preview launch: Feature demo<br> <br><br>PJ Hough, Microsoft Corporate VP, walks you through the key scenarios demonstrated at the new Office preview launch.<br><br><br><br>What you should<br> know about Office Web Apps Server<br> <br><br>Office Web Apps Server Preview is a new Office server product that delivers browser-based versions of Word, PowerPoint, Excel, and OneNote.

Resources for the new Office<br><br><br>·            <br>System requirements for Office 2013<br><br><br>·            <br>Overview of Office 365 ProPlus<br><br><br>·            <br>Volume activation of Office 2013<br><br><br>·            <br>Click-to-Run overview<br><br><br>·            <br>Deploy Office Telemetry Dashboard<br><br><br>·            <br>Security overview

2016 12 19- How Office 365 Collects and Reports Audit Data

https://www.petri.com/office-365-audit-data

This is a form of internal telemetry that has to be manually enabled.

video - Using Office 2013 Telemetry to create Addin Policy

http://office.microsoft.com/en-ca/videos/video-use-office-anywhere-with-office-on-demand-VA103984836.aspx

2014 07 00 Office Telemetry reports on Office 2013 docs and apps

http://searchenterprisedesktop.techtarget.com/tip/Office-Telemetry-reports-on-Office-2013-docs-and-apps

If IT administrators need information on document and application usage, they can use Office Telemetry, an Office 2013 feature that gathers such data.

Office Telemetry supports Office 2003 through 2013 and replaces three Office 2010 tools: Office Code Compatibility Inspector, Office Migration Planning Manager and Office Environment Assessment Tool. The new Telemetry program collects information such as file names, usernames, computer names, computer architectures, dates and times, user counts and Office versions. The Office 2013 Telemetry feature also collects data such as success rates, load times and compatibility.

The system monitors a wide range of Office applications, including not only the full complement of standard Office documents and templates—binary files such as .doc and .ppt; OpenXML files such as .docx and .xlsx, and macro-enabled files such as .dotm and .xltm—but also Office files that contain ActiveX controls and External Data Connections.

In addition, Office Telemetry can monitor a wide range of add-ins, including such types as COM, Excel XLL and Word WLL. Plus, it supports Office apps hosted within client applications.

The Office Telemetry platform

Office Telemetry features a number of components that collect and process data, stores that data in a central database, and makes the data accessible for viewing and reporting. Figure 1 provides an overview of the components in Office Telemetry and how they fit together to gather and present usage information.

Figure 1. The Office Telemetry platform is made up of numerous components.

On each client workstation configured with Office, a Telemetry Agent collects usage and inventory data and periodically uploads that data to a dedicated shared folder. The agent is built into Office 2013, but it must be deployed separately on systems running Office 2003 through 2010. Regardless of how the agent is deployed, it must be specifically enabled through Group Policy or the registry.

Telemetry Dashboard

Once the Telemetry data has been collected into the database, IT administrators can use the Telemetry Dashboard to view that data. The dashboard is a workbook tool built into Excel 2013.

To use the Dashboard, you need only connect to the Telemetry database. You can then explore and analyze the Telemetry data through a variety of views that let you look at summaries of information as well as specific details.

The Dashboard is divided into six main worksheets that provide access to the various types of information available through Office Telemetry:

·    ·          Overview: Provides a bird’s-eye view of the usage and stability of the Office documents and products in an organization, offering insight into how they are behaving on participating client computers.

·    ·          Documents: Displays details about the Office documents being used on each client device such as the total number of users, the Office versions being used, the percentage of successfully opened documents, the number of times a document has been opened and the number of unique critical issues.

·    ·          Solutions: Displays details about the Office add-ins and apps being used on each client computer, providing many of the same details that are available on the Documents worksheet.

·    ·          Telemetry Processor: Provides information about the health of the Office Telemetry infrastructure, such as whether the telemetry processors are running correctly or the client computers are sending data correctly.

·    ·          Deployments: Offers a tabular view of the number of Office clients being monitored, with details about Office versions and system architectures (such as 32BIT vs. 64BIT).

·          Custom Reports: Lets admins create custom reports based on data in the Telemetry database.

Most of these worksheets provide links to additional worksheets that let you drill deeper into Office 2013 Telemetry data. For example, Figure 2 shows the Documents worksheet, which describes a variety of Office-related documents. (The screenshot is taken from the “Telemetry Dashboard worksheet reference,” where Microsoft has posted extensive information about each Dashboard worksheet.)

Figure 2. You can view details about Office documents in the Telemetry Dashboard.

The Document worksheet provides a variety of information about frequently used Office documents. You can use the Query function to narrow a search down to specific documents. You can also click the plus arrows near the top of the worksheet to see more details about a particular category, such as “Office usage.”

In addition, you can click specific links to open additional worksheets that have more granular details. For example, if you click a number in the “Total users**”** column, a worksheet will open and display a list of users who have accessed the associated document.

The Dashboard also lets endpoint administrators protect user privacy by providing mechanisms for setting thresholds, obfuscating document information or excluding applications. Admins can also manage add-ins through the Dashboard to control their use based on factors such as load times or detected issues.

Troubleshooting Office files and custom solutions with the telemetry log

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/office/client-developer/shared/troubleshooting-office-files-and-custom-solutions-with-the-telemetry-log

• 09/17/2015

Use the Telemetry Log for Office 2013 to determine compatibility issues with Office 2013 and solutions built for previous versions of Office.

The following article describes the Telemetry Log and how to use it. For more information about specific results displayed in the Telemetry Log, see Compatibility issues in Office.

This is specifically for Business Windows, but it gives you an idea of what Windows does

Manage connections from Windows 10 operating system components to Microsoft services

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-ca/windows/privacy/manage-connections-from-windows-operating-system-components-to-microsoft-services

    2020-07-07

Applies to

    Windows 10 Enterprise, version 1607 and newer

    Windows Server 2016

    Windows Server 2019

This article describes the network connections that Windows 10 components make to Microsoft and the Windows Settings, Group Policies and registry settings available to IT Professionals to help manage the data shared with Microsoft. If you want to minimize connections from Windows to Microsoft services, or configure privacy settings, there are a number of settings for consideration. For example, you can configure diagnostic data to the lowest level for your edition of Windows and evaluate other connections Windows makes to Microsoft services you want to turn off using the instructions in this article. While it is possible to minimize network connections to Microsoft, there are many reasons why these communications are enabled by default, such as updating malware definitions and maintaining current certificate revocation lists. This data helps us deliver a secure, reliable, and up-to-date experience.

How to turn down Telemetry in Windows 10

https://www.easeus.com/partition-manager-software/fix-windows-10-microsoft-compatibility-telemetry-high-disk-usage.html

View the Telemetry Data that Microsoft collects on Windows 10

https://www.ghacks.net/2018/01/24/view-telemetry-data-windows-10/

by Martin Brinkmann Last Update: January 03, 2020 -

Microsoft plans to launch the Windows Diagnostic Data Viewer app in the next feature update for Windows 10. The company added placeholders for the new feature in previous Windows 10 version 1803 Insider Builds but today's build enables the functionality as a preview.

Microsoft announced its commitment to "be fully transparent on the diagnostic data collected" from Windows devices today and the release of the application adds options to Windows 10 to view collected Telemetry data.

Microsoft says that it wants to increase trust and confidence, and give users increased control over the data.

    Our commitment is to be fully transparent on the diagnostic data collected from your Windows devices, how it is used, and to provide you with increased control over that data. This is all part of our commitment to increase your trust and confidence in our products and services.

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Diagnostics, feedback, and privacy in Windows 10

https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/msoffice/forum/msoffice_other-mso_mac-mso_365hp/data-privacy-and-encryption/03c4dade-a5f9-4744-8ef9-5e0ffa644ce1

Together, diagnostics and feedback are how you and your Windows 10 device tell Microsoft what's really going on.

As you use Windows, we collect diagnostic information, and to make sure we're listening to you, our customer, we've also built ways for you to send us feedback anytime, and at specific times, like when Windows 10 asks you a question about how something is working for you.

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Answer 2

That is mostly true, the "average" MS employee can't  access your data. But  given a court order MS will gladly hand over all of your data to the government. And since most of these court orders include a muzzle, MS won't even tell you what they have done.

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You can make your data more secure by using the best (non MS) encryption tool you can find and encrypt your files BEFORE uploading to OneDrive. 

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https://www.pcmag.com/picks/the-best-encryption-software

Answer 3

Thank you both.

I’d like help with the other part of my question, too. Does Microsoft persist or analyze either metadata about my activity or the contents of my Office 365 documents when those documents are only ever saved locally?

I never want advertising or news based on what I typed in a Word document.

Thanks again.

Answer 4

Hi maximlo

Rest assured, all your data is private to you, all Office 365 data is stored securely on OneDrive and no-one, except for yourself, has access to that data . . .