All of the recent hullabaloo surrounding Microsoft 365's 'connected experiences' has been a misunderstanding, per the company.

The setting in question 'only enables features requiring internet access like co-authoring a document,' Microsoft says.

In the latest controversy, Microsoft has refuted the claim stating that it doesn't use Word documents or Excel data to train its AI models.

Over the past couple of weeks, rumors have surfaced that Microsoft is scraping customers' Word documents and Excel spreadsheets to train its AI systems. These claims arose after Microsoft introduced a new feature in October called Connected Experiences,

Confusion over Connected Experiences settings in 365 apps spark concerns Microsoft's Connected Experiences option in its productivity suite has been causing consternation amid accusations that the default setting might allow Microsoft to train AI models using customers' Word and Excel documents and other data.