Privacy advocacy group NOYB filed two complaints against Microsoft with the Austrian privacy watchdog on Tuesday. The complaints target Microsoft’s online education software.
Schools shifted to remote teaching and students became online learners during the COVID-19 epidemic. This led to an increase in the popularity of online educational programs.
Privacy advocacy group NOYB has filed complaints against Microsoft’s 365 Education suite in Austria. The suite, which includes familiar applications like Word, Excel, and Teams, is used by students.
An advocacy group filed its first complaint. They allege that Microsoft transfers its obligations as a data controller under the GDPR to schools, which lack the necessary data control.
“Under the current system that Microsoft is imposing on schools, your school would have to audit Microsoft or give them instructions on how to process pupils’ data. Everyone knows that such contractual arrangements are out of touch with reality,” NOYB lawyer Maartje de Graaf said in a statement.
“This is nothing more but an attempt to shift the responsibility for children’s data as far away from Microsoft as possible,” she stated.
The second grievance is on cookies that are set up within Microsoft 365 Education. Cookies are used by advertisers to follow customers.
“Our analysis of the data flows is very worrying. Microsoft 365 Education appears to track users regardless of their age. This practice is likely to affect hundreds of thousands of pupils and students in the EU and EEA (European Economic Area),” said NOYB lawyer Felix Mikolasch.
NOYB requested that Microsoft be fined and that the Austrian Data Protection Authority look into its allegations.
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