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Microsoft Copilot is the new name for Bing Chat and Bing Chat Enterprise. For the time being, the names Copilot and Bing Chat Enterprise may be used interchangeably as various parts of the experience transition to the new name. It's accessible from copilot.microsoft.com, Bing.com/chat, Edge, and Windows.
Copilot provides access to powerful AI and is built on the latest large language models, GPT-4 and DALL-E 3. It’s grounded in the Bing search index to provide responses with the most current information and verifiable citations for transparency.
Copilot Versions
Copilot Personal (Bing Chat)
- Designed for personal use (personal account).
- No commercial data protection.
Copilot Enterprise with commercial data protection (Bing Chat Enterprise)
- Used with work account (cnet\M365\Entra ID).
- Commercial data protection included.
- No chat history is retained or made available to users or the organization.
- No third-party plugin supported to prevent data from being sent to external providers.
- Bing mobile app is not currently supported, while Copilot is accessible from mobile browsers, including Edge mobile.
Currently only our faculty and staff have access to Copilot Enterprise via our Microsoft 365 license. Access for students is planned for February of 2025.
Security Features
- Microsoft doesn't retain prompts or responses from Entra ID users when using Copilot. Prompts and responses are maintained for a short caching period for runtime purposes. After the browser is closed, the chat topic is reset, or the session times out, Microsoft discards prompts and responses.
- Chat data sent to and from Copilot with commercial data protection is encrypted in transit (TLS 1.2+) and at rest (AES-128) during the chat session. Microsoft has no 'eyes-on' access to it.
- Because Microsoft doesn't retain prompts and responses, they can't be used as part of a training set for the underlying large language model.
Why Copilot?
- Users are requesting access to GPT-4 for experimentation in teaching and learning.
- Copilot allows University users to have access to GPT-4 and DALL-E 3, Open AI's most advanced generative AI models for texts and images at no additional cost.
- If the University does not turn it on (and communicate it availability) users can turn to other services, free or paid, where there is no control over the data they are using to interact with the tools.
- The existing HIPPA BAA with Microsoft can protect data used with the service.
- The advertising feature is undesirable but is comparable to the experience users have when they access Google Search with their University accounts.
Advertising
Similar to search engines, it can show ads that are based on search queries. Advertising to users is not targeted based on your workplace identity or chat history. So far, the ads are rare but there is no guarantee that they will stay that way.
Accessing Microsoft Copilot
To access Microsoft Copilot, follow the process below. If this your first time access Bing Chat or Bing Chat Enterprise it is best the use the Microsoft Edge Browser.
- Go to https://copilot.microsoft.com
- Select the Sign in button in the Upper right corner then select Sign in again from the menu that appears under the button.
- Enter your UChicago email address.
- The University's single sign-on page appears. Enter your CNetID and password and select Sign in.
- Then, you are prompted with Duo for multi-factor authentication to continue the process.
- It presents you with the option to keep yourself signed in. If you are the sole user of this device, you can select this option.
- You are now signed in to Copilot.
- You may receive an error that states "Sorry, the Microsoft Search beta is limited to a small set of pilot users at this time. Please Contact your IT admin to request access and thanks for your interest."
This could potentially appear if you have never logged into bing.com or copilot.microsoft.com. To correct this issue, please do the following:
- Open Microsoft Edge Browser.
- Go to https://www.bing.com.
- Select the Sign in prompt along the top of the page.
- Log in with your UChicago work or school account.
- Once completely authenticated you should be presented with the Bing AI search interface. Open a new tab in the Microsoft Edge Browser.
- Go to https://copilot.microsoft.com. You may receive the error message again. Simply close the Copilot browser tab and open a new tab in a few moments and return to https://copilot.microsoft.com. There appears to be some provisioning process that Microsoft runs before Copilot becomes fully available. Once the process is completed, you should then be presented with the Copilot AI Interface.
- If you run into any login errors that do not provide the aforementioned error message, please note that while you can use the browser-based version on any supported web browser, Edge is the most reliable. If you encounter an error on another browser, wait 20-30 minutes, then clear the cookies and cache of your original browser and try logging in again. Select the browser you are using for instructions on how to clear your browser cache and cookies:
Microsoft Copilot Generative AI Guidance
Microsoft Copilot can be used to work with non-sensitive data types. These include:
- Publicly available information, general academic concepts, and non-sensitive data.
- De-identified datasets that do not contain personal or sensitive information.
- Institutional data that is not regulated.
University Data Policy
To keep our data safe, the University community must adhere to data protection policies, including the Treatment of Confidential Information and Acceptable Use. As part of these policies, please note that the following types of data may not be used with Microsoft Copilot:
- Medical and Health Data: Information related to medical conditions, diagnoses, treatments, payments, or other personal medical or health information.
- Student Education Records: This includes student records, work products, communications, grades, and enrollment or disciplinary records.
- Other Confidential or Regulated Data: Financial and student aid information, admissions records, and sensitive internal communications. Data that are subject to a data use, confidentiality, or other agreement that prohibits sharing with third parties.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
Can I use Copilot with any browser?
Copilot supports Microsoft Edge (desktop and mobile) and other major non-Microsoft browsers like Chrome, Firefox, and Safari
Does Copilot share any information with OpenAI?
No, all chat data is processed by Microsoft. Additionally, Copilot with commercial data protection doesn’t retain your chat data and it isn’t used to train the underlying large language models.
How to tell you have commercial data protection?
User must sign in with their work account. Above the chat input box and on top of every chat answer, users see a message confirming “Your personal and company data are protected in this chat.” Additionally, users see ‘Protected’ next to their user profile icon and name at top right of the screen.
Does Copilot keep my history?
With commercial data protection, Copilot doesn’t support chat history. It doesn’t retain chat prompt (input) or responses. It also offers no usage of reporting or auditing capabilities to the organization.