27-508. Rule 508. Trade secrets; privilege; protective measures.

A person has a privilege, which may be claimed by him or his agent or employee, to refuse to disclose and to prevent other persons from disclosing a trade secret owned by him, if the allowance of the privilege will not tend to conceal fraud or otherwise work injustice. When disclosure is directed, the judge shall take such protective measures as the interests of the holder of the privilege and of the parties and the furtherance of justice may require.

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Annotations

Procedure established for use by the Nebraska Public Service Commission when deciding whether to publicly disclose information which it has found to be relevant and necessary for its proceedings and which a party contends to be in the nature of a trade secret or confidential research, development, or commercial information. In re Application of Northwestern Bell Telephone Co., 223 Neb. 415, 390 N.W.2d 495 (1986).

Some factors to be considered in determining whether given information is one's trade secret are (1) the extent to which the information is known outside of his business, (2) the extent to which it is known by employees and others involved in his business, (3) the extent of measures taken by him to guard the secrecy of the information, (4) the value of the information to him and his competitors, (5) the amount of effort or money expended by him in developing the information, and (6) the ease or difficulty with which the information could be properly acquired or duplicated by others. In re Application of Northwestern Bell Tel. Co., 223 Neb. 415, 390 N.W.2d 495 (1986).