Another point to add - this is nothing to do with gender or role, Men and women are equally under threat, as are Dome/mes and subs. It does not matter if you are male or female or a Dom or a sub - you are still at risk of being attacked. The 'female sub' you met on the internet may actually be a male serial killer. There is at least one example of this happening in real life that I know of - thankfully not a serial killer. Someone travelled 800 miles to see a woman he had been flirting with on the internet for months only to find that she did not exist and it was his friends playing a joke on him as revenge for something. Ok, relatively harmless in that case, but it could have been much worse.

For online stuff developing into real life I would consider:

- a long period of talking online
- exchange of photos
- include some webcam chat if possible
- include some talking on the phone
- then arrange first meet somewhere neutral with chaperones/support and take it from there

Note: photos can be faked very easily and it is not always possible to spot them. You can get round this by agreeing to exchange photos with specific elements included. ie. I want a photo of you holding today's newspaper, standing in front of a bookshelf while wearing a red hat. If you both agree to do this (with you each setting parameters for the photo) you can be more sure that the person you are talking to is the person in the photo. I have seen complaints from professional Dommes, models and so on that people are going onto their sites and stealing photos to use in faked profile pics. So, ask for a photo where it cannot be stolen from somewhere else, where it is easier just to take the photo as asked.