Microsoft may want to "spy" on your working schedules, a recently published patent reveals

Microsoft has apparently been working on a new system that can predict when your work or school colleagues are less available to chat.

Basically, this system will give users a heads-up about times when their colleagues might not be as easy to reach, and from the look of it, apps like Microsoft Teams could benefit the most out of this. The United States Patent and Trademark Office has recently made Microsoft’s patent application for this system publicly available, although it was initially filed a little while ago in 2022. 

The document talks about a service that predicts and notifies users when their colleagues will be less available. It includes a tool to collect calendar data from each colleague and a detector to figure out when they won’t be as accessible.

But how does it exactly work? Well, the data structure that we’re talking about can mark “conflicts,” such conflicted meetings, and the user’s work hours along a timeline. The system then checks for times when there are no conflicts during work hours. If there aren’t many, it decides the user has less availability. It also checks if there are too many conflicts during work hours, which also means less availability.

You might see messages like “User A will be away soon,” “User A will be gone from A to B,” or “User A will be less available between A and B” displayed on your profile or theirs. Microsoft later describes that the application of this patent could be both for desktop and mobile users.

Maybe this system is coming in future versions of Teams? Who knows.