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Microsoft Takes A Shot At Google With Updated Terms Of Service

Microsoft and Google don’t have the best history of getting along. Case in point: Microsoft’s ‘Scroogled’ campaign, and Google’s refusal to support Microsoft platforms.

The latest of shots fired at Google see Microsoft targeting Google’s thirst for user data, and how that makes some users uncomfortable.

Today, Microsoft is sending out emails to alert users of a change in their terms of service. The changes come across as Microsoft trying to position itself as the anti-Google. Here’s a snippet:

Privacy

As part of our ongoing commitment to respecting your privacy, we won’t use your documents, photos or other personal files or what you say in email, chat, video calls or voice mail to target advertising to you.

The first section is the most apparent shot at Google. By comparison, here are some bullet points from Google’s terms of service:

We collect information in two ways:

Information you give us. For example, many of our services require you to sign up for a Google Account. When you do, we’ll ask for personal information, like your name, email address, telephone number or credit card. If you want to take full advantage of the sharing features we offer, we might also ask you to create a publicly visible Google Profile, which may include your name and photo.

Information we get from your use of our services. We may collect information about the services that you use and how you use them, like when you visit a website that uses our advertising services or you view and interact with our ads and content.

In the two companies’ terms of service you have Microsoft talking about how they don’t collect user data, and you have Google talking about what they collect and how they collect it.

Microsoft appears to be trying to play on consumer fears of data collection, but the reality may be that users aren’t actually that concerned about what Google is doing.

So I’m curious, are you worried about Google collecting your data? Would you prefer they took a softer approach to it like Microsoft? Let me know what you think in the comments section.

Category News
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SEJ STAFF Matt G. Southern Senior News Writer at Search Engine Journal

Matt G. Southern, Senior News Writer, has been with Search Engine Journal since 2013. With a bachelor’s degree in communications, ...

Microsoft Takes A Shot At Google With Updated Terms Of Service

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