French data protection officials have taken the lead on Europe's investigation into Google's new privacy policy, and have asked that the search giant respond to specific questions by April 5.

French data protection officials have taken the lead on Europe's investigation into Google's new privacy policy, and have asked that the search giant respond to specific questions by April 5.

Isabelle Falque-Pierrotin, a member of CNIL (Commission nationale de l'informatique et des libertés), penned a letter to Google's Larry Page on Friday to say that the EU's Article 29 Working Party asked CNIL to head up "analysis" of Google's new privacy policy.

At issue is Google's move to consolidate 70 or so privacy policies across its products down to one, which . But with this change, Google also switched to one profile for users across all services rather than separate logs for offerings like YouTube, Search, and Blogger.

It's that account consolidation bit that has privacy advocates up in arms. In early February, the Article 29 Working Party its privacy policy update until the EU could conduct an investigation. But Google refused, arguing that "delaying the new policy would cause significant confusion."

In her letter, Falque-Pierrotin said "the CNIL deeply regrets that Google did not delay the application of the new policy."

The CNIL did, however, prepare a list of detailed questions in cooperation with all European data protection agencies that it wants Page to address.

Falque-Pierrotin mentioned that Google offered to meet with the Article 29 Working Party "to address concerns," but she argued that "a hearing would be premature at this stage of the process." CNIL needs written responses to its questions before it can reconsider the meeting request, Falque-Pierrotin said.

Among the questions asked are whether Google has received any complaints about its new policies from users and details about how many people visit its privacy website. CNIL also asked for detailed information about the data collected by Google, what that data is used for, and how long it is retained. There were also questions about user rights, how the privacy policy differs from its terms of service, and more.

Google has repeatedly defended its new policy. In a blog post from the day it went live, the company stressed that "as you use our products one thing will be clear: it's the same Google experience that you're used to, with the same controls."