§ 6-1464.Protection of personal and financial information in civil court records.

Civil court files are generally open to the public, which creates a real risk when a pleading, order, or judgment happens to include a party’s Social Security number, birth date, or bank account information. This rule keeps that sensitive data out of the public file. Instead of writing it directly into a pleading, order, judgment, or decree, a party submits it on a separate confidential form — Appendix 4 for general civil cases, and Appendices 5 or 8 for cases arising under Chapter 30 of the Nebraska Revised Statutes — tendered alongside the filing and referenced by it rather than repeated in it.

That separate document gets different handling than the rest of the case file. Filed electronically, it is marked so the public cannot view it; filed on paper, it carries a bold confidentiality notice and the clerk keeps it apart from the case file while still making it available to judges and court staff. Government agencies and officials can get access only through an approved agreement or an application on the form provided for that purpose. Where a court order or decree would otherwise need to state protected information directly — a Social Security number in a support order, for instance — the court seals the original and puts a redacted version in the public file instead. Exhibits used at trial cannot show a complete financial account number, and any account information that does need to appear gets identified in a way that lets the parties, the court, and the jury tell accounts apart without exposing the full number.

Responsibility for keeping this information out of the public record rests with the parties and their counsel, not the clerk. The clerk is not required to check every filing for compliance, though a clerk who spots a violation may choose to provide a redacted copy for public access while preserving the unaltered original for the court and the parties.