"These things are costly," said , executive director of the International Center for Law & Economics, a global think tank.

"They'll have to come up with the usual millions of pages of documents," he said. "It's a costly ordeal. If [the FTC] decides they have enough of a case, they'll want to try it and not settle it. That is potentially very problematic for Google."

Earlier today, Amit Singhal, a Google Fellow, disclosed in a that the company had received notification of an into its business, including the search and advertising operations.

In the post, Singhal said the company would cooperate fully with the federal investigation.

"It's still unclear exactly what the FTC's concerns are, but we're clear about where we stand," Singhal wrote. "Using Google is a choice [for users] -- and there are lots of other choices available to you for getting information."