As announced in early October, from today Google will start to include your name and profile photo from your Google account in certain ads.
This is part of Google’s ‘shared endorsements‘, a system that lets you see any recommendations your friends on Google+ have left across Google services like the Play Store and Google Maps. If you allow it, and by default the setting is ‘off’, Google will use your photo and name in Google Ads that use the ‘shared endorsements’ system.
In a Google+ post, the search giant showed some examples of how this might be used, which you can see below.
Users under 18 will be able to see recommendations by other users, but their information will not be used in ads (and they will not have the option to allow them).
Although this is an ‘opt-in‘ system, it’s hard not to see this as Google using user generated content to improve ads and revenue, without benefiting the users involved. However, as Google offers its services for free, this can be seen as an optional cost of using them. Unlike Facebook, Google has been very careful to be transparent about the introduction of using users in ads, which is much better than hiding such a feature in complicated ‘terms of service’ agreements.
[Source: Google]
