OVHcloud says the complaint is co-signed by other cloud companies but declines to name which ones. Either way, the fundamental allegation of the complaint is as follows: The way Microsoft licenses its Office productivity suite (Office 365) means it is more affordable for customers to opt for Azure as well. “Through abusing its dominant position, Microsoft undermines fair competition and limits consumer choice in the cloud computing services market.”
Response
Microsoft has already issued a response to the claims, arguing it offers customers the opportunity to access other cloud providers freely: “Cloud providers enjoy many options to provide cloud services to their customers using Microsoft software, whether purchased by the customer or the partner,” a company spokesperson claims. “We’re continuously evaluating how we can best support partners and make Microsoft software available to customers across all environments, including those of other cloud providers.” As mentioned, this is hardly the first time Microsoft has at the spotlight of scrutiny on it in Europe. Back in 2017, the Dutch DPA, Autoriteir Persoongegevens said Microsoft is failing to tell Windows 10 Home and Pro customers which data the platform collects. In 2018, Dutch regulatory pointed to eight privacy issues in Office 2016 and Office 365 ProPlus. These issues were reportedly allowing Microsoft to collect data from Dutch users through apps stored on US-based servers. Tip of the day: With a single registry tweak, it’s possible to add a ‘Take Ownership’ button to the right-click context menu that performs all of the necessary actions for you. You’ll gain full access to all possible actions, including deletion, renaming, and more. All files and subfolders will also be under your name. The Take Ownership context menu will set the currently active user as the owner of the files, though they must also be an administrator. They can then enter the folder or modify the file as they usually would.
