Sec. 503.
As used in this chapter:
(a) "Affiliate" means any company that controls, is controlled by, or is under common control with another company.
(b) "Annual notice" means the privacy notice required in section 513.
(c) "Clear and conspicuous" means that a notice is reasonably understandable and designed to call attention to the nature and significance of the information in the notice.
(d) "Collect" means to obtain information that the licensee organizes or can retrieve by the name of an individual or by identifying number, symbol, or other identifying particular assigned to the individual, irrespective of the source of the underlying information.
(e) "Company" means any corporation, limited liability company, business trust, general or limited partnership, association, sole proprietorship, or similar organization.
(f) "Consumer" means an individual, or the individual's legal representative, who seeks to obtain, obtains, or has obtained an insurance product or service from a licensee that is to be used primarily for personal, family, or household purposes. As used in this chapter:
(i) "Consumer" includes, but is not limited to, all of the following:
(A) An individual who provides nonpublic personal information to a licensee in connection with obtaining or seeking to obtain financial, investment, or economic advisory services relating to an insurance product or service. An individual is a consumer under this subparagraph regardless of whether the licensee establishes an ongoing advisory relationship.
(B) An applicant for insurance prior to the inception of insurance coverage.
(C) An individual that a licensee discloses nonpublic, personal financial information about to a nonaffiliated third party other than as permitted under sections 535, 537, and 539, if the individual is any of the following:
(I) A beneficiary of a life insurance policy underwritten by the licensee.
(II) A claimant under an insurance policy issued by the licensee.
(III) An insured under an insurance policy or an annuitant under an annuity issued by the licensee.
(IV) A mortgagor of a mortgage covered under a mortgage insurance policy.
(ii) So long as the licensee provides the initial, annual, and revised notices under this chapter to the plan sponsor, group or blanket insurance policyholders, and group annuity contract holder and does not disclose to a nonaffiliated third party nonpublic personal financial information other than as permitted under sections 535, 537, and 539, "consumer" does not include an individual solely because he or she meets 1 of the following:
(A) Is a participant or a beneficiary of an employee benefit plan that the licensee administers or sponsors or for which the licensee acts as a trustee, insurer, or fiduciary.
(B) Is covered under a group or blanket insurance policy or group annuity contract issued by the licensee.
(iii) "Consumer" does not include an individual solely because he or she meets 1 of the following:
(A) Is a beneficiary of a trust for which the licensee is a trustee.
(B) Has designated the licensee as trustee for a trust.
(g) "Consumer reporting agency" has the same meaning as in section 603(f) of the federal fair credit reporting act, title VI of the consumer credit act, Public Law 90-321, 15 U.S.C. 1681a.
(h) "Customer" means a consumer who has a customer relationship with a licensee. However, customer does not include an individual solely because he or she meets 1 of the following:
(i) Is a participant or a beneficiary of an employee benefit plan that the licensee administers or sponsors or for which the licensee acts as a trustee, insurer, or fiduciary.
(ii) Is covered under a group or blanket insurance policy or group annuity contract issued by the licensee.
(iii) Is a beneficiary or claimant under a policy of insurance.
(i) "Customer relationship" means a continuing relationship between a consumer and a licensee under which the licensee provides 1 or more insurance products or services to the consumer that are to be used primarily for personal, family, or household purposes.
(j) "Initial notice" means the privacy notice required in section 507.
(k) "Insurance product or service" means any product or service that is offered by a licensee pursuant to the insurance laws of this state or pursuant to a federal insurance program. Insurance service includes a licensee's evaluation, brokerage, or distribution of information that the licensee collects in connection with a request or an application from a consumer for an insurance product or service.
(l) "Licensee" means a licensed insurer or producer, and other persons licensed or required to be licensed, authorized or required to be authorized, registered or required to be registered, or holding or required to hold a certificate of authority under this act. Licensee includes, except as otherwise provided, a nonprofit health care corporation operating pursuant to the nonprofit health care corporation reform act, 1980 PA 350, MCL 550.1101 to 550.1704, and a nonprofit dental care corporation operating pursuant to 1963 PA 125, MCL 550.351 to 550.373. Licensee includes an unauthorized insurer who places business through a licensed surplus line agent or broker in this state, but only for the surplus line placements placed under chapter 19. Licensee does not include any of the following:
(i) A nonprofit health care corporation for member personal data and information otherwise protected under section 406 of the nonprofit health care corporation reform act, 1980 PA 350, MCL 550.1406.
(ii) The Michigan life and health guaranty association and the property and casualty guaranty association.
(iii) The Michigan automobile insurance placement facility, the Michigan worker's compensation placement facility, and the assigned claims facility created under section 3171. However, servicing carriers for these facilities are licensees.
(m) "Nonaffiliated third party" means any person except a licensee's affiliate or a person employed jointly by a licensee and any company that is not the licensee's affiliate. Nonaffiliated third party includes the other company that jointly employs a person with a licensee. Nonaffiliated third party also includes any company that is an affiliate solely by virtue of the direct or indirect ownership or control of the company by the licensee or its affiliate in conducting merchant banking or investment banking activities of the type described in section 4(k)(4)(H) of the bank holding company act of 1956, chapter 240, 70 Stat. 135, 12 U.S.C. 1843, or insurance company investment activities of the type described in section 4(k)(4)(I) of the bank holding company act of 1956, chapter 240, 70 Stat. 135, 12 U.S.C. 1843.
(n) "Nonpublic personal financial information" means personally identifiable financial information and any list, description, or other grouping of consumers and publicly available information pertaining to them that is derived using any personally identifiable financial information that is not publicly available. Nonpublic personal financial information does not include any of the following:
(i) Health and medical information otherwise protected by state or federal law.
(ii) Publicly available information.
(iii) Any list, description, or other grouping of consumers and publicly available information pertaining to them that is derived without using any personally identifiable financial information that is not publicly available.
(o) "Opt out" means a direction by the consumer that the licensee not disclose nonpublic personal financial information about that consumer to a nonaffiliated third party, other than as permitted by sections 535, 537, and 539.
(p) "Personally identifiable financial information" means any of the following:
(i) Information a consumer provides to a licensee to obtain an insurance product or service from the licensee.
(ii) Information about a consumer resulting from any transaction involving an insurance product or service between a licensee and a consumer.
(iii) Information the licensee otherwise obtains about a consumer in connection with providing an insurance product or service to that consumer.
(q) "Producer" means a person required to be licensed under this act to sell, solicit, or negotiate insurance.
(r) "Publicly available information" means any information that a licensee has a reasonable basis to believe is lawfully made available to the general public from federal, state, or local government records by wide distribution by the media or by disclosures to the general public that are required to be made by federal, state, or local law. A licensee has a reasonable basis to believe that information is lawfully made available to the general public if both of the following apply:
(i) The licensee has taken steps to determine that the information is of the type that is available to the general public.
(ii) If an individual can direct that the information not be made available to the general public, that the licensee's consumer has not directed that the information not be made available to the general public.
(s) "Revised notice" means the privacy notice required in section 525.
History: Add. 2001, Act 24, Imd. Eff. June 18, 2001
Popular Name: Act 218