Microsoft's privacy statement has recently been updated to explain the nature of the personal information it collects from your computer when running Windows 10, including payment data, data about your interests and contact information.
Spoken commands to Cortana, Microsoft's digital assistant, are also saved to enable a more customised user experience with more relevant suggestions, the company said.
Windows 10: accessing your data
“We will access, disclose and preserve personal data, including your content (such as the content of your emails, other private communications or files in private folders), when we have a good faith belief that doing so is necessary to protect our customers or enforce the terms governing the use of the services,” Microsoft said in its recently update new terms of services agreement.
“Windows does not collect personal information without your consent. To effectively provide Windows as a service, Microsoft gathers some performance, diagnostic and usage information that helps keep Windows and apps running properly. Microsoft uses this information to identify problems and develop fixes.”
The saved data is used to "improve and personalise" each user's experience of using Windows 10, for targeted adverts via a unique customer advertising ID and to inform users of new software, security and account updates. "However, we do not use what you say in email, chat, video calls or voice mail, or your documents, photos or other personal files to target ads to you," Microsoft's privacy statement reads.
It's worth pointing out that Google similarly sweeps its users' emails in order to provide them with more targeted advertising, while Apple's digital assistant Siri and Google's Google Now also collect user data in order to personalise their responses.
Microsoft collects:
- Search queries submitted to Bing
- A voice command to Cortana
- Private communications including email content
- Information from a document uploaded to OneDrive
- Requests to Microsoft for support
- Error reports
- Information gathered from cookies
- Data collected from third parties
If you're especially concerned about the kind of data you're sharing with Microsoft, you can adjust it by opening up Settings > Privacy and toggling off the various inputs. Turning off location services means Cortana will no longer work. You can opt out of personalised adverts by visiting this Microsoft page.
