You can find documentation and examples how to use the annotations for personal data in the API documentation. This section covers some further best practices.

Logging Personal Data

You might want to take extra care of logging personal data, which is either to prevent it from being logged or to ensure that such log entries go to a secured environment.

To do so, you may use markers of the Simple Logging Facade for Java (SLF4J). Markers enable filtering your logs by cross-cutting concerns, such as authentication and authorization or for log entries which contain personal data. Find more about filtering in the corresponding Logback documentation.

The CoreMedia API provides a set of predefined markers also for personal data. You will find them as part of com.coremedia.common.logging.BaseMarker which are:

Read the corresponding documentation for more details how and when to use them.

In order to log personal data explicitly it is recommended to use the logger com.coremedia.common.logging.PersonalDataLogger. It provides the very same logging methods as a standard SLF4J Logger having its parameters already annotated with @PersonalData. For details and usage examples have a look at the API documentation.

Logging Exceptions

To log exceptions which might (or will) contain personal data, you should consider using the helper class com.coremedia.common.logging.PersonalDataExceptions. It will log the original exception securely, using the markers mentioned above and rethrow a new exception which is directly under your control. The tool will ensure that there is a reference between the new exception and the logged one which eases tracing the exceptions although the cause hierarchy is not available by intention.