§ 44-6021 — Confidentiality and prohibition on announcements; prohibited uses

(1)(a) All risk-based capital reports, to the extent the information in the reports is not required to be set forth in a publicly available annual statement schedule and risk-based capital plans, including the results or reports of any examination or analysis of an insurer or a health organization performed pursuant to the Insurers and Health Organizations Risk-Based Capital Act and any corrective order issued by the director pursuant to examination or analysis, with respect to any domestic insurer or domestic health organization or foreign insurer or foreign health organization which are filed with the director shall constitute information that might be damaging to the insurer or health organization if made available to its competitors and therefor shall be kept confidential by the director and shall not be public records subject to disclosure pursuant to sections 84-712 to 84-712.09 . This information shall not be made public or be subject to subpoena other than by the director and then only for the purpose of enforcement actions taken by the director pursuant to the act or any other provision of the insurance laws of this state.
(b) Such risk-based capital reports, risk-based capital plans, and corrective orders may be provided to other state, federal, foreign, and international regulatory and law enforcement agencies and the National Association of Insurance Commissioners and its affiliates and subsidiaries if the recipient agrees in writing to maintain the confidentiality of the information.
(c) The director may receive such risk-based capital reports, risk-based capital plans, and corrective orders from other state, federal, foreign, or international regulatory and law enforcement agencies and from the National Association of Insurance Commissioners and its affiliates and subsidiaries. The director shall maintain as confidential or privileged information received pursuant to this subdivision if received with notice or the understanding that it is confidential or privileged under the laws of the jurisdiction that is the source of the information. Such information shall not be a public record subject to disclosure by the director pursuant to sections 84-712 to 84-712.09 , subject to subpoena, subject to discovery, or admissible in evidence in any private civil action, except that the director may use such information in any regulatory or legal action brought by the director. The director, and any other person while acting under the authority of the director who has received information pursuant to this subdivision, may not, and shall not be required to, testify in any private civil action concerning any information subject to this section. Nothing in this section shall constitute a waiver of any applicable privilege or claim of confidentiality in the information received pursuant to this subdivision as a result of information sharing authorized by this section.
(2) It is the judgment of the Legislature that the comparison of an insurer's or a health organization's total adjusted capital to any of its risk-based capital levels is a regulatory tool which may indicate the need for possible corrective action with respect to the insurer or health organization and is not intended as a means to rank insurers or health organizations generally. Therefor, except as otherwise required under the Insurers and Health Organizations Risk-Based Capital Act, the making, publishing, disseminating, circulating, or placing before the public or the causing, directly or indirectly, to be made, published, disseminated, circulated, or placed before the public, in a newspaper, magazine, or other publication, or in the form of a notice, circular, pamphlet, letter, or poster, or over any radio or television station, or in any other way, an advertisement, announcement, or statement containing an assertion, representation, or statement with regard to the risk-based capital levels of any insurer or health organization or of any component derived in the calculation, by any insurer or health organization, agent, broker, or other person engaged in any manner in the insurance business would be misleading and is therefor prohibited. If any materially false statement with respect to the comparison regarding an insurer's or a health organization's total adjusted capital to any of its risk-based capital levels, or any of them, or an inappropriate comparison of any other amount to the insurers' or health organizations' risk-based capital levels is published in any written publication and the insurer or health organization is able to demonstrate to the director with substantial proof the falsity of such statement or the inappropriateness, as the case may be, the insurer or health organization may publish an announcement in a written publication if the sole purpose of the announcement is to rebut the materially false statement.
(3) It is the further judgment of the Legislature that the risk-based capital instructions, risk-based capital reports, adjusted risk-based capital reports, risk-based capital plans, and revised risk-based capital plans are intended solely for use by the director in monitoring the solvency of insurers and health organizations and the need for possible corrective action with respect to insurers and health organizations and shall not be used by the director for ratemaking nor considered or introduced as evidence in any rate proceeding nor used by the director to calculate or derive any elements of an appropriate premium level or rate of return for any line of insurance which an insurer or a health organization or any affiliate is authorized to write.

Legislative History

Source: Laws 1993, LB 583, § 33; Laws 1994, LB 978, § 42; Laws 1999, LB 258, § 26; Laws 2001, LB 52, § 52.