how do you know if you're talking to LE online?

[fununcle]

I have had a couple of online chats that I am very, very sure were with LE trying to set up a sting. There's things you can tell, apart from the situation being too good to be true. In one case that was the most obvious that I was involved in, they were trying to set up the parameters for meeting up in all the ways that put me in a position to be identified as the person they chatted with (oh but here's a fake identity you can use for privacy--that we discussed here in our chat that ties you to all the explicit talk of sex with kids) and was incriminating and every counter proposal I had (which by this point was just me playing with them because I knew what they were doing) to move it to something with better opsec they had a lame excuse for not doing that made no real sense.

The key is to trust no one, and not let any tiny little excuse let them talk you out of any bit of your common sense about keeping the situation under your control and safety, and not meeting them in a location they choose ahead of time and control and monitor.

And even then, the best advice is still probably not to meet anyone.

[Lillab]

More often than not, I assume it is a pedo hunter and not actual LE. We live in a world full of vigilantes. They do the leg work, then turn it over to LE, who happily take it from there. So, the result is basically the same either way, but it's a bunch of amateurs out there fishing, and less officers on the clock. There are lots of people out there that don't know what they are doing as they try to catch you, but don't let that distract you from the few people who are particularly good at their job and much harder to spot, and can collect additional information through warrants and working with ISPs, VPNs, and any other businesses.

[ManWithAPlan]

Meet your girls in person & assume every single person your talking to online is either LEA or a Vigilante