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User data privacy from institutions with Office 365 Proplus

Anonymous
2015-10-19T01:52:36+00:00

Hi,

I have searched everywhere about this but can't find much information, except a couple things that conflict with each other.

My question concerns student and faculty at universities where we have been given Office 365 Proplus.

This allows us to install the Office suite on up to 5 personal devices.

Besides perhaps seeing how many devices we have installed Office on, does the university have any access to our data that is used in Office or on Microsoft websites?

If I login to Office using a university email address, can the university see any of my data, documents, One Note or One Drive files or other information?  ( I read one page that said the university could change things like permissions on your One Drive and should only be used for school related work, which seemed to indicate they could access it ).

If I login to Office with a personal Microsoft account, can the university see anything at all regarding any of the above? If a personal account is used in Office, does it get linked in any form to the Microsoft account that was created with the university email address?

Thank you for taking the time to explain privacy for users of Office 365 Proplus on personal devices.

Microsoft 365 and Office | Subscription, account, billing | For home | Windows

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  1. Anonymous
    2015-10-24T18:57:28+00:00

    Without clarification from MS, the best I can tell is:

    If you are student or faculty using the Office 365 ProPlus on a personal device, and you install the Office suite or use outlook.com, OneDrive, etc., :

         1. The university has access to your documents and data under your .edu account.

         2. If you sign into these products with a personal account, the university won't be able to link it to your

             student account, but may still have access to your documents and data used with the personal account.

         3. If you are on campus and connect to the network with a device, the university can see your documents

             and data regardless of what account you use.

        4. If you use Office and don't sign in, there is a possibility the university can see your documents.

    I wish I could get a response from Microsoft.

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  2. Anonymous
    2015-10-23T03:15:37+00:00

    Hi, can anyone at Microsoft please answer these questions and clarify the privacy of students and faculty from universities on their personal devices?

    Thank you.

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  3. Anonymous
    2015-10-19T14:29:05+00:00

    Hi,

    Welcome to Microsoft Community.

    I would like to know if the computer is connected to the domain network.

    If all the people in the university are using the same Microsoft account, that is if you are sharing the Microsoft user name and password, then the user information is accessed.

    Personnel account used in Office, does it not get linked in any form to the Microsoft account that was created with the university email address.

    I hope the above suggestion helps. If you need further assistance, get back to us and we will be glad to assist you.

    Thank you.

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  4. Anonymous
    2015-11-01T21:30:09+00:00

    Anyone?

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  5. Anonymous
    2015-10-22T14:02:18+00:00

    Hi, I don't understand your response. I am talking about Proplus for education.

    If we bring our laptop to school, we connect by wifi to the student or university domain (depending on if you are a student or faculty. However, everyone has their own assigned Microsoft username and password in an educational setting- no university has students or staff sharing that. When I connect to their domain, do they have access to my Microsoft related information??

    And to clarify, if we only sign into Office with a personal account, are you saying the university has zero access to any of our information, including documents, files, and our OneNote and OneDrive accounts?

    What about when we use our individual, school assigned Microsoft account based on our school email address?

    Thank you

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