Microsoft on Wednesday denied claims that it uses data from users of its Microsoft 365 applications, including Word and Excel, to train artificial intelligence models. Reuters Reported
The backlash came after some users took to social media to point out that the company is asking users to opt out of its “connected experiences” feature, which they say is meant to train AI models. was used for
“These claims are false. Microsoft does not use customer data from Microsoft 365 users and commercial applications to train the underlying language models,” a Microsoft spokesperson said in an emailed statement. Reuters.
The spokesperson added that “connected experiences” enable features like co-authoring and cloud storage, and have nothing to do with how the company trains its big language models.
Conversations on social media show that people are concerned about their data being used to train AI models without permission.
The company also said Bleeping computer That this optional setting has been on by default since it became available in April 2019.
“The Connected Experiences feature enables features such as co-authoring, real-time grammar suggestions, and web-based resources,” Bleeping computer was told.
“These features are on by default because they’re the features people naturally expect in a cloud-connected productivity tool. However, users always have control and can adjust their connected experience settings at any time.” can.”