7 ms·

We don't do any training on your data. Telemetry is largely for feature use tracking (eg we should really do better around this component, everyone is using it)

We don't do any training on your data. Telemetry is largely for feature use tracking (eg we should really do better around this component, everyone is using it). There is absolutely no ads overlap at all. Literally none. Disclosure: I work at Azure but not on VS Code

spectramax 7y ago
Thank you for the insight. Would you know if this is written somewhere on the VS Code homepage or privacy policy? I think it should be highlighted!
- TheIronYuppie 7y ago
  Yep - here! https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/compliance/gdpr-dsr-visual-studio-family https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/compliance/gd...
komali2 7y ago
Is there a way we can see what data specifically is being sent to your servers from our local VSCode installations?
- AdamTReineke 7y ago
  (Disclaimer, work at Microsoft. Not on VS Code.) I expect you should be able to run Fiddler or Wireshark or similar traffic sniffers to see the requests.
  - spectramax 7y ago
    I presume these requests are encrypted? So, it is hard to know what exactly is being sent.
  - yellowapple 7y ago
    At least in theory, it shouldn't be necessary to go to such an extreme, considering that VS Code is ostensibly FOSS and thus readily auditable for this sort of thing: https://github.com/Microsoft/vscode https://github.com/Microsoft/vscode This assumes, of course, that y'all aren't doing any weird code-injecting funny business when packaging it up for installation :)
- CodeCube 7y ago
  Check the docs here :) https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/compliance/gdpr-dsr-visual-studio-family#personal-data-we-collect https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/compliance/gd...
AJ007 7y ago
What people want to hear is there is none, and there never will be. Even that isn’t enough, but at least there is some legal recourse.
- icxa 7y ago
  We need to stop relying on the assertions Big Tech make about themselves, and work towards regulation. What most viewers saw during the Facebook congressional hearing was woefully out of touch, forgive me for using this phrase “old white guys” questioning Mark with many facepalm-able moments. But the house hearing, which includes 40 representatives from the Millennial generation, who grew up on tech, asked much better questions. It just got swallowed up by the news cycle because the Manafort Raid was happening at the same time as hearing about the Cambridge Analytica scandal was occuring. All of this is still new. Banking, Finance, Real Estate, those are all well regulated at this point and arguably much more sophisticated or complex. The situation we have now with the Googles, Amazons, Microsoft, Facebooks of the world packaging up our metadata, combining it with other third party data, training AI, etc is all new, and those who are knowledgeable about it are just now making it into congress, so I am optimistic we will start to see real regulation on these shameful business practices soon. Roger McNamee had an excellent conversation on the Sam Harris podcast recently about all of this. It was a very good conversation and one I highly recommend listening to.
- TheIronYuppie 7y ago
  Can you say more? Like there is none what? If there are any changes to this doc - https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/compliance/gdpr-dsr-visual-studio-family https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/compliance/gd... - you would be able to check that immediately, and we would never change our data collection policy without changing that document... It's the law! Disclosure: I work at Azure on machine learning but not VS Code
  - ionised 7y ago
    He means no telemetry. None whatsoever. At the very least a default opt-out.
thereare5lights 7y ago
Is there any way we can verify this?
- scrollaway 7y ago
  If you can't trust Microsoft employees saying it, then it's most likely you won't be able to trust anything short of running Wireshark to verify the outgoing data, no?
- TheIronYuppie 7y ago
  For better or worse, here - https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/compliance/gdpr-dsr-visual-studio-family https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/compliance/gd... However, if you don't trust us (and I get it!) Your best bet is just to opt out which you can do at any time, including during install. Disclosure: I work at AZure on machine learning but not VS Code
- e12e 7y ago
  If in the EU you could ask for all collected data under the GDPR. [ed: all personal data - so there might be some set of aggregated, non-identifable data that they might not be required by gdpr to allow insight to - that is however a pretty high bar to clear (and intertwines with being allowed to sample / collect that data in the first place, informed concent, defaulting to not collecting data (opt-in) etc]
rurp 7y ago
A big tech company harvesting extensive user data by default and saying it's ok because "Trust us, we don't do anything bad with it" is not a compelling argument these days. Even if it's true (and that's a big if), that says nothing about what Microsoft will do with the data tomorrow, or the next day.
- TheIronYuppie 7y ago
  It's on by default, but literally the first thing we ask you, actively, is about giving us feedback and let you turn it off right then. It's not remotely hidden. I totally understand, though about trust. We've been asking users for feedback for 20+ years, I hope we've shown ourselves to be good actors! Disclosure: I work at Azure on machine learning
  - pm90 7y ago
    @ThIronYuppie Let me say first of all that I really appreciate your sincerity and belief in the Goodness of the company that you work for. The issue is not insincerity, but: * a lack of trust in corporations in today's economic and political climate and * the skyrocketing growth of the online advertising business, which has made user data quite literally the gold mines of the digital age The incentives today are very very well aligned for a corporation to sell user data. Even if a company may mostly be made of good people, without explicitly written contracts or declarations of any kind, a Company can change internal policies rather quickly. Maybe there will be a manager who sees the selling of that data as a way to boost profit and rise within the company. Maybe the company sells that division along with their data.
    - kohtatsu 7y ago
      s/gold/oil/
    - ionised 7y ago
      You say the issue is not insincerity but I beg to differ. Microsoft has never been particularly sincere about the reasons it does the things it does. It has been a deceitful bully of a company for a long time. Indeed, one of the main reasons why there is so little trust in corporations is because they are so insincere, anti-consumer and lacking in any kind of social conscience.
mwilsonthomas 7y ago
You can read more about exactly how the IntelliCode feature uses telemetry and data here: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/visualstudio/intellicode/intellicode-visual-studio#telemetry https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/visualstudio/intellicode/in... - No user-defined code is sent to Microsoft, but we do collect information about your use of the IntelliCode results. For base model suggestions, which are open source or .NET types and members, we capture whether you selected an IntelliCode suggestion and log the name of the suggestion. Microsoft uses the data to monitor the quality of the base model. For custom models, we capture whether you selected an IntelliCode suggestion but do not log the names of your user-defined types or methods. Thanks Mark Wilson-Thomas Program Manager Visual Studio IntelliCode

spectramax 7y ago

Thank you for the insight. Would you know if this is written somewhere on the VS Code homepage or privacy policy? I think it should be highlighted!

TheIronYuppie 7y ago
Yep - here! https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/compliance/gdpr-dsr-visual-studio-family https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/compliance/gd...

komali2 7y ago

Is there a way we can see what data specifically is being sent to your servers from our local VSCode installations?

AdamTReineke 7y ago
(Disclaimer, work at Microsoft. Not on VS Code.) I expect you should be able to run Fiddler or Wireshark or similar traffic sniffers to see the requests.
- spectramax 7y ago
  I presume these requests are encrypted? So, it is hard to know what exactly is being sent.
- yellowapple 7y ago
  At least in theory, it shouldn't be necessary to go to such an extreme, considering that VS Code is ostensibly FOSS and thus readily auditable for this sort of thing: https://github.com/Microsoft/vscode https://github.com/Microsoft/vscode This assumes, of course, that y'all aren't doing any weird code-injecting funny business when packaging it up for installation :)
CodeCube 7y ago
Check the docs here :) https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/compliance/gdpr-dsr-visual-studio-family#personal-data-we-collect https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/compliance/gd...

AJ007 7y ago

What people want to hear is there is none, and there never will be. Even that isn’t enough, but at least there is some legal recourse.

icxa 7y ago
We need to stop relying on the assertions Big Tech make about themselves, and work towards regulation. What most viewers saw during the Facebook congressional hearing was woefully out of touch, forgive me for using this phrase “old white guys” questioning Mark with many facepalm-able moments. But the house hearing, which includes 40 representatives from the Millennial generation, who grew up on tech, asked much better questions. It just got swallowed up by the news cycle because the Manafort Raid was happening at the same time as hearing about the Cambridge Analytica scandal was occuring. All of this is still new. Banking, Finance, Real Estate, those are all well regulated at this point and arguably much more sophisticated or complex. The situation we have now with the Googles, Amazons, Microsoft, Facebooks of the world packaging up our metadata, combining it with other third party data, training AI, etc is all new, and those who are knowledgeable about it are just now making it into congress, so I am optimistic we will start to see real regulation on these shameful business practices soon. Roger McNamee had an excellent conversation on the Sam Harris podcast recently about all of this. It was a very good conversation and one I highly recommend listening to.
TheIronYuppie 7y ago
Can you say more? Like there is none what? If there are any changes to this doc - https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/compliance/gdpr-dsr-visual-studio-family https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/compliance/gd... - you would be able to check that immediately, and we would never change our data collection policy without changing that document... It's the law! Disclosure: I work at Azure on machine learning but not VS Code
- ionised 7y ago
  He means no telemetry. None whatsoever. At the very least a default opt-out.

thereare5lights 7y ago

Is there any way we can verify this?

scrollaway 7y ago
If you can't trust Microsoft employees saying it, then it's most likely you won't be able to trust anything short of running Wireshark to verify the outgoing data, no?
TheIronYuppie 7y ago
For better or worse, here - https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/compliance/gdpr-dsr-visual-studio-family https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/compliance/gd... However, if you don't trust us (and I get it!) Your best bet is just to opt out which you can do at any time, including during install. Disclosure: I work at AZure on machine learning but not VS Code
e12e 7y ago
If in the EU you could ask for all collected data under the GDPR. [ed: all personal data - so there might be some set of aggregated, non-identifable data that they might not be required by gdpr to allow insight to - that is however a pretty high bar to clear (and intertwines with being allowed to sample / collect that data in the first place, informed concent, defaulting to not collecting data (opt-in) etc]

rurp 7y ago

A big tech company harvesting extensive user data by default and saying it's ok because "Trust us, we don't do anything bad with it" is not a compelling argument these days. Even if it's true (and that's a big if), that says nothing about what Microsoft will do with the data tomorrow, or the next day.

TheIronYuppie 7y ago
It's on by default, but literally the first thing we ask you, actively, is about giving us feedback and let you turn it off right then. It's not remotely hidden. I totally understand, though about trust. We've been asking users for feedback for 20+ years, I hope we've shown ourselves to be good actors! Disclosure: I work at Azure on machine learning
- pm90 7y ago
  @ThIronYuppie Let me say first of all that I really appreciate your sincerity and belief in the Goodness of the company that you work for. The issue is not insincerity, but: * a lack of trust in corporations in today's economic and political climate and * the skyrocketing growth of the online advertising business, which has made user data quite literally the gold mines of the digital age The incentives today are very very well aligned for a corporation to sell user data. Even if a company may mostly be made of good people, without explicitly written contracts or declarations of any kind, a Company can change internal policies rather quickly. Maybe there will be a manager who sees the selling of that data as a way to boost profit and rise within the company. Maybe the company sells that division along with their data.
  - kohtatsu 7y ago
    s/gold/oil/
  - ionised 7y ago
    You say the issue is not insincerity but I beg to differ. Microsoft has never been particularly sincere about the reasons it does the things it does. It has been a deceitful bully of a company for a long time. Indeed, one of the main reasons why there is so little trust in corporations is because they are so insincere, anti-consumer and lacking in any kind of social conscience.

mwilsonthomas 7y ago

You can read more about exactly how the IntelliCode feature uses telemetry and data here: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/visualstudio/intellicode/intellicode-visual-studio#telemetry https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/visualstudio/intellicode/in... - No user-defined code is sent to Microsoft, but we do collect information about your use of the IntelliCode results. For base model suggestions, which are open source or .NET types and members, we capture whether you selected an IntelliCode suggestion and log the name of the suggestion. Microsoft uses the data to monitor the quality of the base model. For custom models, we capture whether you selected an IntelliCode suggestion but do not log the names of your user-defined types or methods. Thanks Mark Wilson-Thomas Program Manager Visual Studio IntelliCode