The Federal Trade Commission is continuing its nvestigation of Google's actions in bypassing the default privacy settings of the Apple Safari browser for Google users, reports the "Mercurcy News" (http://macte.ch/MrX0P), quoting unnamed "sources familiar with ongoing negotiations between the company and the government."

Within the next 30 days, the FTC could order the Mountain View search giant to pay an even larger fine in the Safari case than the US$25,000 fine the FTC hit Google with last week for "deliberately impeding and delaying its investigation into a 2010 privacy breach involving its Street View cars.

The FTC investigation focuses on whether Google violated he terms of an existing settlement involving privacy problems with its "Buzz" social network in 2010, notes the "Mercury News." The agency could carry sanctions as large as $16,000 per violation per day, the article adds.