If you care about privacy, then peer to peer trades are always going to be better. However, if you need proof of purchase or sale for tax purposes make you get that. I know some countries require proof of funds, and what they were used for. Using an exchange in that sense will allow you to prove they were sold on an exchange.
Usually, though it's just a record of the sale, rather than why.
Take standard precautions and you will be quite safe:
- Arrange your meeting during the day in a busy public location - choose somewhere with CCTV if you want, like a large shopping mall
Can I just add to this, that when entering your passwords into a wallet then try to do this away from CCTV. CCTV is usually the shop owners responsibility, unless they're the local council or whatever the equivilant is in other countries. So, technically if you don't trust that shop owner then they could potentially see your credentials, which could become problematic if you visit that store regularly. I'd say it's probably very unlikely, but something to consider if you care about security. Since, if they know your credentials, then you're a potential target.
Like I said, relatively low chance of being a threat, but definitely something to consider. For example, you see this all the time since there are usually cameras on ATM's, and people don't care too much about showing their pin or unlocking their phones (which likely are the same pins/password's which they use across different devices/services, obviously don't do that either).
