Did you know that artificial intelligence (AI) software systems – computer programs that can update and “think” by themselves – are increasingly being used by the legal community?
In 2023, ‘Harvey’ became big news in the Legaltech world.
Harvey is an AI platform that can help lawyers perform legal tasks in areas such as due diligence, litigation, and compliance. Described as “the innovative artificial intelligence platform built on a version of Open AI’s latest models enhanced for legal work,” Legaltech startup Harvey, the self-styled “generative AI for elite law firms,” is being adopted by 3,500 lawyers across the offices of Allen & Overy, the seventh largest law firm in the world.
Tools like Harvey, however, are not the first AI supported programs to assist lawyers.
The World’s First Robot Lawyer
The app DoNotPay, created by Joshua Browder, has been described as “the world’s first robot lawyer”.
It helps users draft legal letters. You tell its chatbot what your problem is, such as appealing against a parking fine, and it will suggest what it thinks is the best legal language to use.
“People can type in their side of an argument using their own words, and software with a machine learning model matches that with a legally correct way of saying it,” he was quoted by BBC News as saying.
The app has since spread across the UK and US, and it can now help the user write letters dealing with a range of issues; insurance claims, applying for tourist visas, complaint letters to a business or local authority, getting your money back for a holiday you can no longer go on or cancelling gym membership. Mr Browder says the last two uses soared during the pandemic.
Many human lawyers are fans of AI software as it helps to trawl through huge quantities of case documents.
Read more here.
Tradition Meets Modern Technology
Earlier this year, judges in England and Wales were given cautious permission to use AI in writing legal opinions.
The legal profession in the UK is over 1,000 years old and while many traditional aspects of law are honoured such as wearing wigs and robes, this is seen as a positive step into the future.
The Courts and Tribunals Judiciary last month said AI could help write opinions but stressed it shouldn’t be used for research or legal analyses because the technology can fabricate information and provide misleading, inaccurate and biased information.
“Judges do not need to shun the careful use of AI,” said Master of the Rolls Geoffrey Vos, the second-highest ranking judge in England and Wales. “But they must ensure that they protect confidence and take full personal responsibility for everything they produce.”
Ryan Abbott, a law professor at the University of Surrey and author of “The Reasonable Robot: Artificial Intelligence and the Law” was quoted by The Washington Post as saying;
“AI and the judiciary is something people are uniquely concerned about, and it’s somewhere where we are particularly cautious about keeping humans in the loop,” he said. “So I do think AI may be slower disrupting judicial activity than it is in other areas and we’ll proceed more cautiously there.”
Check out the full article here.
Misuse of Artificial Intelligence
Here’s a case where AI and lawyers unfortunately didn’t work out.
Earlier this year, a New York federal judge sanctioned lawyers who submitted a legal brief written by the artificial intelligence tool ChatGPT, which included citations of non-existent court cases.
In addition to each paying a $5,000 fine, the attorneys, Peter LoDuca and Steven Schwartz, and their Levidow law firm, were ordered to notify each judge falsely identified as the author of the bogus case rulings about the sanction. When they submitted the A.I. written brief in their client’s lawsuit against the Avianca airline, they “then continued to stand by the fake opinions after judicial orders called their existence into question.”
Judge P. Kevin Castel said he might not have punished them if the attorneys had come “clean” about using ChatGPT to find the purported cases the A.I. cited.
Read more here.
Chat GPT has become an incredibly popular AI tool but has been criticised for sometimes producing nonsensical or inaccurate information, including breaching other people’s copyrighted works by plagiarising their words. A number of copyright lawsuits have been filed against the creators of Chat GPT for copyright breaches.
Artificial Intelligence Ethics Framework
Here in Australia, whether you use artificial intelligence in your products or services or not – Consumer Law requires businesses to ensure their claims are true, accurate and able to be substantiated.
To assist business owners, the Australian Government has created an Artificial Intelligence Ethics Framework.
The principles are voluntary. The government intend them to be aspirational and complement – not substitute – existing AI regulations and practices.
By applying the principles and committing to ethical AI practices as a business owner, you can:
- build public trust in your product or organisation
- drive consumer loyalty in your AI-enabled services
- positively influence outcomes from AI
- ensure all Australians benefit from this transformative technology
The principles at a glance:
- Human, societal and environmental wellbeing
- Human-centred values
- Fairness
- Privacy protection and security
- Reliability and safety
- Transparency and explainability
- Contestability
- Accountability
To see what the 8 AI ethical principles are in detail head to:
https://www.industry.gov.au/…/australias-ai-ethics…
While many industries have been feeling nervous about AI taking over their jobs, the legal field generally hasn’t felt threatened. It’s always been one of the industries experts have tipped as being safe from AI.
It’s unlikely AI legal technology will greatly change the legal industry. A best case scenario is that AI will help lawyers serve more people, particularly those litigants who can’t afford or access legal services.
As for ChatGPT, it’s probably best left out of legal briefs presented to court (particularly if they cite court cases that don’t exist).
