The "vigilantes" are not only giving the information to the police, but they are also personally standing behind the information they publish, thereby being personally and directly liable for false accusations they make.
They are being held accountable the same way everyone else is, by the justice system.
Not a bad counterpoint, but Kuihman's point is that it's possible for all the info you hand to the cops to be
true, but info about the circumstances around
how you got that info to paint the situation in a new light and the catcher(s) in a negative one.
For instance, someone could
accurately report a pedo to the police for sending nudes to a kid, but neglect to mention to the cops that it happened in
their server where
they added the pedo and the kid for the sake of
intentionally provoking an inappropriate interaction between the two, with no direct encouragement on the part of the catcher. In this hypothetical, all of the info handed to the cops would still be accurate and admissible in court (unless there's some precedent idk about that covers the admissibility of evidence like that), but
most people would consider the circumstances behind the situation to be unethical on the part of the catcher.
Now
obviously I'm not saying I think Schlep is doing that (nor is Kuihman necessarily saying that - he's just a distrustful cynic). I think Schlep is most likely keeping his nose clean and running his operation ethically and fully within the bounds of the law and evidence admissibility standards. However, I
am still putting my trust in Schlep's character when I say this. Kuihman's point is just that we can't
know for a fact what's going on behind the scenes without a third party organization auditing the pedo-catching group in question, and that he personally doesn't feel comfortable putting
his trust in the character of someone he doesn't know on the Internet.
Again, is this cynical? Absolutely. Is this criticism likely to bear fruit with regards to Schlep? I
seriously doubt it. But can I really discount the position on its face and say it has no basis whatsoever? Eh, I just don't think so, even if I don't fully agree with it in this instance.