I highly agree with OP and I also believe that one should avoid in person trading at any cost. Although, Binance as added it as a way to trade with people who belong to same location where you live but such approach if very risky especially for those area where crime rate is high.
Trading "In Person" is one of many trading types on P2P trading platforms. It is risky, first for your privacy, anonymity; second for your safety. You can fall in a bad trade "in person" with a bad trade partner. The trade can be set up to rob your coins or worse you will be kidnapped, killed, whatever by criminals.
I think it's way better to go with the traditional p2p route where someone can send money to someone else via a bank account or digital bank payments as that one is quite good as compare to in person trading. There should be a caution that "In person trading is a risky thing and one should avoid it at any cost."
If things include trade can be done online, through Internet, through middle man and Escrow, let's do it.
It is safer to have Escrow for a trade and if you don't have to meet in person to complete the trade, it's good for both safety (life), privacy and anonymity. Those P2P trading platforms are built to provide safe trading for people.
P2p trading on Binance is safe for most people who live in areas where crime rate is low, and even in countries where crime rate is higher people can still do online p2p trading without much worries. However, cash trading is quite risky and can be very harmful for the ones who blindly go with that route of trading.
I am not sure about it. They require KYC like many exchanges but does KYC reduce criminal activities on those platforms?
The answer is it fails to do it to protect their customers.
Why KYC is extremely dangerous -- and useless?