PERSONAL bests

Open the Mail and Say Ahh

There can be such a thing as getting too personal. Tailoring the content of a printed piece to the individual recipient has been seen as a positive, but the risk of a backlash grows as people find more of their lives becoming an open book.

Privacy can also become an issue in another way with variable data communications. If sensitive information is included in a database provided to a print provider, that data must be secured, and care used, when incorporating it into the printed piece. The March edition of PRINTING IMPRESSIONS included a story on database management (Takin’ Care of Business) that featured some recent lapses by printers in dealing with sensitive data, but there have been many more reports of sensitive databases being “lost” by various other parties.