Your data, controlled by you notification in Office Apps

Office 365 subscribers see a message that reads Your data, controlled by you when they open an Office app. What is this new notification about and why do you see it when trying to open an Office app? Let us take a look at this.

‘Your data, controlled by you’ notification in Office 365

Firstly, ‘Your data, controlled by you’ notification that you see in Office is not an error message or warning but a legit notification and looks something like the image shown above. It’s a part of Microsoft Office’s new privacy controls. As Microsoft remains committed to providing its users control over information that they want to share or allow to be collected and used when using Office 365, it displays this message. Through this, users to configure privacy controls as per their preferences.

When you see the notification on your computer screen, you can follow these courses of actions:

1. Accept the notification message
2. Configure if you would like to send Optional data to Microsoft
3. Allow Office to power your experiences

1] Accept the notification

Microsoft’s ongoing commitment to privacy has led to the framing of new principles that guide the company’s approach to increasing transparency and customer control over data collected by Microsoft’s major products. As such, you see the notification appearing, when you launch an Office 365 app. So, when you see this message, hit the ‘Next’ button visible at the bottom of the window.

2] Configure if you would like to send Optional data to Microsoft

As soon as you hit the ‘Next’ button, you’ll be directed to a new screen that lets you choose to send/ do not send the Optional data to Microsoft. You can select any of the below-given options

• Yes, send optional data
• No, don’t send optional data

If you know, there are two levels of diagnostic data for Office Desktop,

1. Required Diagnostic Data
2. Optional Diagnostic Data

Both these types of data are used to detect, diagnose, and rapidly address issues before they become large-scale problems or cause security risks. In addition to this, the Optional Data helps Microsoft learn about the preferences across a large set of customers.

3] Allow Office to power your experiences

Once, you choose the desired option, you’ll be directed to the final screen of ‘Powering your Experiences’. It enables Office 365 subscribers to connect their experiences to online services and analyze its content to deliver recommendations and suggestions.

Microsoft intends to use this data to keep the Office apps secure, up to date, and performing as expected, as well as to make product improvements.