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Google Launches Identity Verification Badge Scheme
theodp writes "CNET reports that rather than backing down after complaints about its insistence that Google+ user accounts be opened under a real name, Google has upped the ante and will pin 'verification badges' on users in an effort to assure people that 'the person you're adding to a circle is really who they claim to be.' In a Friday night post, Google employee Wen-Ai Yu explained that the Google+ team is initially 'focused on verifying public figures, celebrities, and people who have been added to a large number of Circles, but we're working on expanding this to more folks.'"
You privacy advocates usually fail to make your case. You just tell us about all the ways in which our information can be exposed, but don't really explain why we should care. The idea of precision-targetted advertising doesn't scare us, and your Orwell references are just too far fetched.
Tell me, what are the plausible abuses of my private information that I should fear, and why?