Hi all, I’d appreciate your advice/input on the privacy of Microsoft/Google paid products as opposed to the “free” (but paid for by allowing a profile to be built).
I ask here because I find the level of discussion to be better than the “knee jerk” anti- Microsoft/Google found elsewhere where some contributions are simply “don’t use Microsoft / Google” without reasoned logic to backup the opinion
Thanks in advance.
I would say that Google would be the better choice.
Last time I looked into it many years ago, Google Workspace’s privacy policy seemed better than Microsoft 365’s. Microsoft’s had some ambiguous language and structure that could be interpreted as them using the companies data for advertisement.
I highly recommend reading the following posts:
I’d loathe to say it but maybe a review of their Terms and Conditions/EULA should be done but it is in legalese… Maybe some LLMs can help with that but then, I’d rather ask a lawyer but that may mean bill payment on the part of the firm.
On security I would agree. If you are big enough of a business Microsoft is more willing to customize and disable things although that becomes more and more of a pain.
For me, Microsoft is better than Google for two reasons. First, my company needs customisation and has enough tech guys. Microsoft is highly customisable, and plus it has got teams as a game changer. I hate Google Meet and Chat and they don’t have proper apps at all. That’s why some companies with Google Workspace buy also Zoom.
Second, I don’t use any Microsoft service in my personal life, so it’s only for work. But for Google I am using some Google services, notably maps ( it sucks but no good alternative here). So, it would be correlated with my personal and work account.
The biggest drawback is that collaboration is more difficult on Microsoft when you have small teams but many partners. The number one complaint from my colleagues is that you must create separate accounts for each tenant and register MFA even if it is just accessing some simple documents and channels.
Edit: additional explanation.
Please use Libre & Free software. Paying Google, even if your own privacy might not be harmed, you will encourage a privacy-invasive company.
Honestly, they are now good free alternatives. If you really don’t want any difficult setup : Proton Suite + Cryptpad + Matrix
sorry but for a mid size and above business this still is not a viable option. We for example still lack: IAM, SSO, MDM, inspection tools, ticketing systems, group mailboxes, integrated document cloud, security and compliance monitoring. Let alone managed hosting solutions, A services system is critical to the operations and if not working smoothly is just throwing money away. I get your ambition but simply the offerings are not ready. I am sure you could set this all up and tight everything together but running such will be crazy expensive compaired to settling with one of the major providers. Also by doing that you open up a insanely large attack factor which will be very expensive to secure. Don’t get me wrong, I wish it was different. But just telling businesses to move to something like you suggest isn’t very helpful.
If you think that there is libre software that can be alternative to Google or Microsoft, you have no idea.
I completely agree. Especially Microsoft has very sophisticated tools and the integration among them is seamless vis a vis other products. For organisations, being able to implement organisational policies is crucial. You cannot control everybody, and people do stupid things, falling for phishing, malware etc.
Even properly setting up A MS 365 tenant by following best practices is very difficult. Integrating matrix, proton, or other software together is not technically possible.
I really wish there are alternatives, but unfortunately there is none. Even the European Institutions or municipalities that seem to be against Big Tech in front of media use Google or Microsoft in background.
But the OP question was between Google and Microsoft. AFAIK Google only has Docs/Sheets/Powerpoints + communications.
What companies are you working in? Why do you need those technologies (just curious)
For mail, you can use Thunderbird, at least the company I worked for used it for emails, not sure that’s what you mean.
Tbf, I haven’t got a lot of experience, but open alternatives do exist, and you should use them as much as possible. Just because you need Microsoft for some things, doesn’t mean you need to use them for everything. For example, you can use Microsoft Teams, but still use Cryptpad for shared documents.
We don’t realise the power of ecosystems, and the dangers of them. Not until I started de-Googling, I realized Google was everywhere in my life, because I had used it since a child (thanks to the bundling of Android). Schools, and also companies plays a role.
No one excepts a company to use 100% FLOSS software, but even 20% would be huge.
and plus it has got teams as a game changer. I hate Google Meet and Chat and they don’t have proper apps at all. That’s why some companies with Google Workspace buy also Zoom.
In my previous company we were using different solutions for mail hosting, VoIP, cloud storage, project tracking, forms and of course MS office. At one point it was considered to switch everything, or whatever is possible to MS (e.g. teams, sharepoint, ms project, visio…) . But at the end we just continued paying MS365 licenses to have Word & Excel.
So, it doesn’t have to be MS or Google, or EverythingMS/EverythingGoogle. I know it’s not so easy to use many different services in larger organizations, but for 50-100 people (users) companies, it might be ok not to go all in.
Any enterprise level company needs that, especially IT, Manufacturing and Healthcare companies.
Any medium-to enterprise level company will need this kind of setup. In addition, some sectors require certifications, you cannot jump into any app you want.
Why you neeed this, let me explain briefly. You will provide phone and laptops to employees and you need endpoint solutions, you need to see logs, who shared what, what is going with emails, users, sign in risks, conditional access to ban certain IP addresses, you need dumb proof, MFA, and much more.
And most of the time the people you work with have no idea about tech, is below average Joe.
Last but not least, the integration is king. You need to connect all of them, and see what is going on and connect the dots.
Edit: I am not even mentioning Single Sign On, otherwise you have to manage credentials for each user per platform.
