Beware of Groomers Here and Other "Friend Finder" Subs and Discord Servers

Full disclosure about me before I start. I am 31M. Published Author. Twitch Streamer, and I have been online since 1997. I have years of experience online through chatrooms in the late '90s to every communication system you have ever seen except BBS boards in the early '90s. I work in cybersecurity, and I've volunteered with groups who reported child predators to the IC3 (FBI's cybercrime division).

If you have any questions after reading this post, please ask below. If it's something you don't feel comfortable asking in public, you can send me a message. I'm here to make friends too so if you wanna just ping me to say hey that's great too!

There have been numerous cases of illegal child material trading on Discord, Candid (owned by Uber now), Periscope, and even Twitter that have been ignored. So please use caution and don't trust the staff to handle this issue on external websites.

I'm not sure if I saw this pop up here, but I just saw one pop up on r/InternetFriends. It was another one of these "Friend Finder" discord servers for people 13-18. These servers are a prime feeding ground for online predators. There is no way for discord to prove your age/gender/any other factors. Predators are well known to pose as underage people to get illegal materials from minors.

Anyone under 18.

1. Don't send pictures of yourself. Even if you are clothed head to toe and wearing a burka. No pictures!
2. Do not get on the phone or voice chat with these people.
3. Don't give anyone your personal profiles like Facebook, Snapchat, Twitter, Tumblr, UNLESS you are using a fake name, and have NO PERSONAL INFORMATION. No phone #, address, real name, family name, etc. Then it might be okay.
4. Don't give anyone any personal information that could lead to this person harassing you, stalking you IRL or online.
5. Delete WhatsApp. Period. That thing shares your location with people. It's literally DOX ME the app. So get rid of that one. Use anything else.
6. Delete Facebook. Get your friend's and family on a different platform or just have their phone numbers so you can text them. If you must use it for some reason make a sock account (look it up). The first place any predator or doxer is gonna go to find your dox, pics, or info about you is FACEBOOK.

Predators are a lot smarter than you think. Even something like your face or pics of your family/friends could lead to them finding your profiles and stalking you online or IRL. Just block them if you are suspicious. Do not feel bad; it's not your fault if you got tricked.

If you are uncomfortable or unsure of someone you are speaking to in DMs or offsite, block them. You don't owe them anything. If they whine and complain or keep harassing, you notify the moderators of the subreddit you are on or worst-case scenario make a new account and nuke the old one. Don't let a groomer/pedo shame you into staying around. Block and run. No exceptions.

Edit - Thanks for the awards everyone! Thanks for all the nice comments. My messages are open to anyone who wants to talk or hangout on discord. DM me for my tag!