Google+, the search engine giant's social network, has signed up about 25 million users in its first month, making its early popularity more impressive than Facebook's or Twitter's. And that's great for consumers, who apparently really do not care about privacy, security, account glitches or buggy programs. But for enterprises, which are legally accountable for some of these matters, Google+ raises too many red flags right now.

The mere fact that the network runs on Google's platform sounds a symphony of alarm bells on the privacy and security front, and this week we link to tips from e-discovery expert Joshua Kubicki, who outlines several considerations to review before allowing employees to use the new social network. It's hard to know exactly what information will be collected and how it will be used. What's more, even those users wizardly enough to have mastered Google's byzantine privacy-settings labyrinth probably won't keep up with changes going forward. If a search function is added to Google+ down the road, it's anyone's guess right now what data might be searched. 

Security experts expect that Google+ will become a hotbed for spammers once commercial interests are allowed in. The same kinds of security issues that plague other social networks are likely to make their way to Google+, writes Bill Brenner in a post at CSO. There are sure to be hacked accounts, and bad actors will use phony profiles to lure unsuspecting users into divulging valuable information. 

But Google's (NASDAQ: GOOG) poor track record with regard to its customers' privacy (if you want more on its creepy behavior with Plus, take a look at a post by Julie Bort at Network World) and the absence of any suggestion that the network will be secure aren't the only reasons to think twice about letting employees use it. As ZDNet's Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols wrote last week, the application is beta software, and "it's as dependable as a car with engine problems." Vaughan-Nichols reports that people have gone in and out of his Google+ Circles, and his posts have disappeared "for hours at a time." Other beta applications from Google may have been pretty polished, but this one is not, he warns.

People have been getting kicked out of Google+ "for not using their real names, for violating the Google terms of service, or--for all we can tell--looking funny," Vaughan-Nichols writes. At the root of a lot of the problems is plain old mismanagement. The company hasn't adequately thought through its policies. 

Note that not one of the above critics dislikes Google+ altogether, and some really love it. But when you add up all of their concerns, the sum points to one big Proceed With Caution sign. - Caron

UPDATE: I've written a response to the comments below, which you can read here.