On Friday, Google announced that it would be using user’s contents and picture in advertisements across its network.
If a Google Account user gives a +1 or writes a review for a product or business then Google will use the user’s photo and what the user said about the product alongside the advertisement for the product or business endorsed by them.
The shared endorsement ads will only be displayed to the user’s social circle friends and members or to those with whom the user has opted to share information like +1s and reviews. If the user doesn’t want their information to be displayed by Google, they can just opt out by navigating to Google’s shared endorsement settings and uncheck the box at the bottom and then lastly click on ‘Save’.
The new text in Google’s “Your Content in our Services” section of terms of service has been changed. Google notes in the updated text that it may display a user’s profile name, photo and actions in its services, “including displaying in ads and other commercial contexts.”
However, the search engine giant notes that if users have settings wherein they have limited sharing or visibility settings enabled, it will be honour those settings.
Google will also display user’s +1s or reviews in non-ad content. Like for example if the user gave a 5-star review to an album on Google Play, the user’s friends, if navigate to the same Google Play page will be able to see the review.
Facebook’s similar advertising scheme called sponsored stories ended up in a class-action lawsuit against the social networking site for which the company had to pay a settlement price of $20 million.
