The new breaks are the result of the Support Anti-Terrorism by Fostering Effective Technologies (SAFETY) Act passed by Congress at the end of 2002. There will be two levels of protection for companies, with details posted on Homeland Security’s Web site, safetyact.gov. Companies with technologies that get designated by the department will have their liability limited to the amount of insurance they’re mandated to carry; their clients will be protected, too. Punitive damages are entirely barred. So are lawsuits in state courts.
Companies that jump through extra hoops can receive special approval from the department, giving them even broader protections that are typically offered the federal government itself. This legal shield presents huge marketing opportunities for producers of everything from e-mail-profiling software to chemical antidotes, suggests Kevin Kalinich, a technology risk consultant for Aon Risk Services in Chicago.
Kalinich is working with clients who want to get on those lists so they can sell their technologies to third parties with a claim of government approval. “What a feather in their caps that would be,” he says. It should also help to encourage entrepreneurs who might otherwise be wary of getting into the antiterrorism business.
