To Catch a Predator

To Catch a Predator is an American reality television series that featured hidden camera investigations by the television newsmagazine program Dateline NBC. It was devoted to impersonating underage youth and detaining adults who contact them over the Internet for sexual liaisons. People are lured to meet with a decoy under the pretense of sexual contact and then confronted. Show host Chris Hansen clarified in an interview with National Public Radio that these subjects should be labeled as potential sexual predators, and not pedophiles. "Pedophiles have a very specific definition, people who... are interested in prepubescent sex," he stated. This distinction is not emphasized on the show itself, and the term "pedophile" is sometimes used on the program to describe the perpetrators, including once by Hansen himself. The series premiered in November 2004, and featured 12 investigations in total held across the United States. The investigations were conducted as undercover sting operations with the help of on-line watchdog group Perverted-Justice.
more