Find out how much of your activities can be seen by your organization
In many offices and schools, Microsoft Teams has been the glue that holds everything together. Without applications such as Microsoft Teams, it would be impossible to function without putting our lives at risk.
However, when you’re using an application like this, particularly with an account for a school or organization A question that’s not so easy to answer is often brought up. Are our teachers or bosses able to monitor our activities in Microsoft Teams to keep tabs on our activities? What happens to outside Teams? These are all legitimate concerns particularly for those who are a victim of micromanagement at work or at school. Let’s tackle them.
Table of Contents
Does Microsoft Teams Track Any Activity?
Microsoft Teams does track your activity. In addition, it creates detailed reports based on your activities. Report admins and administrators of the organization can utilize these reports to determine how many users within the company use Microsoft Teams. The question is how much does Teams monitor your activities? The reports on usage within Microsoft Teams are mainly of two kinds that are: Users Activity Reports and Device Usage Reports. The reports are available for the last seven 30 or 90 days.
Another report includes information on how often you actually utilize Microsoft Teams, as in the extent to which you participated in Teams for a specific time. However, it doesn’t provide specific reports on the time you’re Teams were active, or absent. The report is merely a summary regarding whether or not you utilized Microsoft Teams in the time period that the report covers.
The reports on user activity and device activity reports combine details about the way users are making use of Microsoft Teams and on what device.
Utilizing User Activity Reports, admins can view the usage patterns of each user individually. They can track how many users you interact with on an as-needed base, i.e., without setting up a meeting, either in a 1:1 or group chat. You can track how many meetings you arranged or participated in and the way you communicated with them using messages, whether it was via private 1:1 chats or group chats, or through channels.
In essence Teams share all information regarding your video, audio screen-sharing time, as well as chats. However, the reports contain only data and not the contents of your private messages.
Device Usage reports show the device you’re making use of Microsoft Teams on. This means that your administrators are aware of the time you were using Teams on your PC as well as on your mobile. However, these reports show an average latency of 24 hours and as long as 48 hours.
Does it track another activity?
In addition to Microsoft Teams, all your activities within other Microsoft applications is tracked by the administrators of your company. Microsoft 365 administrator’s center has activity reports for all of the apps.
However, when it comes to activities that are not related to Microsoft Teams and other Microsoft applications, Teams does not track it. If you’re concerned about whether Teams will monitor other apps or websites you’re browsing or browsing history when you log into Microsoft Teams, don’t be. Teams doesn’t track it.
However, your company still has the ability to. If you’re using a corporate device, such as a smartphone or your device is associated with Microsoft Intune or another company-owned system management platform Your company is able to track your activities. If you’re using a corporate VPN it is also able to monitor your internet usage.
You can now use Microsoft Teams with the exact information about how much of your activities can be tracked. It’s impossible to do anything about it however, at least now you are aware. As it’s not a lot of details It’s not all bad.