Google’s new policy change sparks protests

Google’s plans to change its endorsed advertising have sparked protests among Google+ users.

In a move to rival the ‘social’ ads pioneered by rival Facebook, the multi-billion pound internet giant has announced plans for a shared endorsements policy change, which will see people’s faces and comments about products and places put into adverts, starting 11 November.

The new ads will use personal information from Google+ members, so that when a user publicly endorses a brand or product, that person’s image may show up in an ad.

Despite Google saying that opting out of the system was easy (and anybody under the age of 18 is automatically exempt) a number of people have swapped their profile pictures to a photo of Google boss Eric Schmidt to avoid having their own face appear within the ads.

“Those ads are attractive to marketers, but they unfairly commercialise Internet users’ images”, said Marc Rotenberg, director of online privacy group EPIC. “It’s a huge privacy problem.”