Lawmakers discuss cybersecurity breaches, looting after natural disasters

By Fred Knapp , Senior Reporter/Producer Nebraska Public Media

Feb. 12, 2025, midnight ·

Sen. Christy Armendariz speaks Wednesday (Photo by Fred Knapp, Nebraska Public Media News)

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Companies that lose customers’ data to hackers will get more legal protection under a bill advancing in the Nebraska Legislature. And there would be tougher penalties for people who commit crimes in areas after a natural disaster, under a proposal heard during a public hearing Wednesday.

Senators returned Wednesday to considering a proposal that would make it tougher to sue companies that lose customers data to hackers. Sen. Robert Hallstrom’s bill (LB241) would raise the legal test for class action suits from simple negligence to willful, wanton or gross negligence. Hallstrom argued that class action lawsuits against big companies often produce very small payments to individual customers, but huge payouts for lawyers. However, Sen. Danielle Conrad argued that class action lawsuits are important.

“In addition to individual compensation, class actions may be the only way to actually impose costs and accountability on the wrongdoer who is responsible for widespread harm, and this also helps to deter future wrongdoing,” Conrad said.

Sen. Christy Armendariz, supporting the bill, talked about her experience negotiating cybersecurity coverage for a business.

“I was in one particular negotiation with arguably, probably the best cyber security company, maybe even in the world, and we're paying them seven figures or more. And I said, ‘I'm fine with paying that, guarantee me with the use of your security, we will not get a breach.’ And they said ‘There's no way.’ They will not guarantee there will not be a breach.”

Armendariz says consumers are already protected under existing law.

Senators voted 33-9 to give the bill first round approval.

Wednesday afternoon, senators on the Judiciary Committee heard a proposal by Sen. Brad von Gillern to increase penalties for people who loot or commit other crimes in the aftermath of natural disasters. Von Gillern, who’s from Elkhorn, described one family’s experience after last year’s tornado there.

“It struck late afternoon, early evening, as they often do, it was still light for a long time, they went back to their home… they gathered Rubbermaid tubs and filled them up with everything they could find, put them in the garage, came back the next day, and they were gone…It just breaks my heart…I couldn't even get my head around the possibility that that would happen,” he said.

Von Gillern’s bill would bump up each offense committed in a disaster area by one level of seriousness: for example, theft of over $5,000 would go from a class 2A felony, punishable by 0-20 years in prison, to a class 2 felony, punishable by 0-50 years.

Sen. Terrell McKinney questioned how much the proposal would cost. Von Gillern was quick to answer.

“If you commit a crime you need to go to jail, and if that costs the state money to protect the public from people who want to do bad things, I'm good with that, and I think most of the public is good with that,” von Gillern said.

McKinney also asked about whether increasing penalties would actually reduce crime.

“Will it actually be a deterrent? Because a lot of people that we're talking about don't follow the Legislature, don't follow when laws change. So how will it actually deter if they don't even know this increase in penalty happened?” McKinney asked.

“I don't know how these individuals know what the penalties are for anything. But if there's a shred of human dignity in them or kindness, they have to know that it's a greater crime being committed under these circumstances,” von Gillern said.

McKinney, an opponent of expanding the state’s prison system, told von Gillern why he was asking.

“I asked that because our prisons are overcrowded, although we're building a new prison that's going to be overcrowded day one,” McKinney said.

“Different topic for a different day,” von Gillern replied.

The committee took no immediate action on von Gillern’s proposal.