Great analysis. So why did Google choose to use PDFs instead of JPGs directly?
Subverting the most popular document format, one which even provides built-in support for digital signatures is probably much more interesting than subverting the JPG format.
Open challenge: build two signed PDFs with identical signatures and different contents - it's not necessarily hard, and it would definitely drive the point home.
[0] https://courses.engr.illinois.edu/cs461/sp2015/static/proj1.... (see part 4)
On the other hand, PDFs are almost universally sent as-is, increasing the risk of being able to 'fool' someone.