COMMENT: Terrorist War about to be Virtual?

CNET reports that the UK police is asking for special powers to carry out cyber attacks on terrorist website. While no details had been released, it was suggested that denial of service attack would be carried out. This new power is fraught with dangerous possibilities. Just as the Brazilian bystander who was innocently shot to death, innocent websites overseas could become targets under this new powers. Worse still, as the report quoted a former policeman who posed the issue of what if the target is a government website overseas? Is this a declaration of an online war?

For me, what is obvious must be the logical conundrum that while cyberattacking a site by hackers (e.g. by Denial of Service Attacks) is clearly a crime - how could the law enforcement agencies be able to use the same method and conduct themselves in the same manner - but yet be legitimate?

I guess the best analogy is that criminals cannot use firearms to hurt or kill but the police can do so to prevent further harm and danger to the public even if it means killing the criminal. However, how many innocent websites will become a victim like the Brazilian in London before a true blue terrorist site is brought down?

U.K. cops want to attack terrorism Web sites CNET News.com