Thermal transfer printing is a well-established, reliable, economical, durable, and quality printing method. However, the transfer ribbon residual image contains all the information of the printed matter (the “reverse” image of the printed information). This can be a tremendous security issue if the third-party gets hold of the used ribbon, especially if the printer is used for privacy-sensitive matters. The information can be safeguarded by destroying the ribbon in conventional ways such as shredding. However, such methods involve removing the ribbon from the printer equipment and processing it externally.What we developed is a new heating head that is ideal for this application as it can be built into the printer or attached as an external unit of an existing printer. The heating head maintains a constant temperature suitable for melting the ink on the ribbon so that the original information is rendered unrecognizable. The startup time for the heating head from cold to operating temperature is a few seconds, a feature that is also attractive no energy is wasted while the unit is on standby. The construction of the head is unique and it is virtually free of heating surface abrasion problems.