Your account history now powers Microsoft’s redesigned Copilot app

Key Takeaways

• Microsoft released a new updated Copilot app for Android powered by personal Microsoft account data.
• This new Copilot collects user data from Microsoft account history, such as emails and calendar events, for personalized AI experiences.
• Privacy concerns arise as Copilot will use personal data for customization.

Remember the "old" Copilot app for Android? No? Well, it might be worth reminiscing about, because Microsoft just released a fully-redesigned Copilot app for Android devices , and this time, it is powered by all the information in your personal Microsoft account.

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Microsoft announced the new app today in a blog post. The updated app will leverage your Microsoft account history to help Copilot provide more personalized recommendations and AI experiences. This means Copilot will tap into all your data -- emails, calendars, documents, even those rare Bing searches -- to understand you better.

The privacy conundrum once again raises its head

The new copilot is different from the previous iteration in how much data it collects, and from where. The "old" Copilot stored data from your interactions with the app. And while Microsoft scraped data from the web to power its AI, the individual user was not impacted all that much.

This shift in data collection raises questions about data privacy. How much user data will be used for personalization, and how much will go to power the LLM? Microsoft assures that Copilot will safeguard all data, but offers no specifics

This is not Microsoft Copilot's first brush with privacy concerns. Microsoft announced back in May that Copilot would take screenshots of people's Windows PCs to help "personalize" the AI experience. The blowback was immediate and loud, so much so that Microsoft backtracked on it and scrapped the idea. Instead it seems the company will simply scrape all your personal data instead.

Here is Microsoft's vision for the new Copilot

The company emphasizes this data will be used to make everyone's life better. Copilot can purportedly attend doctor's appointments with you, take notes, and schedule a follow up, without you needing to lift a finger. It can plan a child's birthday party and summarize a long college lecture. Those a few of the scenarios Microsoft lays out in their announcement.

The reliance on personal data to power these features is likely to spark debate. Users will need to heavily weigh the pros of having this super-helpful AI in their pocket against the cons of letting AI mine some of their most private and personal data .