Imagine a world where legal research is conducted by lightning-fast algorithms, mountains of contracts are reviewed in minutes and legal briefs are drafted with the eloquence of Shakespeare. This is the future promised by AI in legal practice. Indeed, AI tools are transforming this landscape already, venturing from science fiction into the everyday realities of lawyers and legal professionals.
However, this advancement raises ethical and regulatory concerns that threaten the very foundation of the justice system. At a time when the Post Office Horizon scandal has shown how a trusted institution can quickly wreck its reputation after introducing an opaque algorithmic system, it’s important to anticipate potential pitfalls and address them in advance.
We’ve already seen generative AI used at the highest levels of the profession. Lord Justice Birss, deputy head of civil justice in England and Wales, disclosed a few months ago that he had used ChatGPT to summarise an area of law, then incorporated it into his judgment. This marked the first instance of a British judge using an AI chatbot – and it’s just the tip of the iceberg.
For instance, I’m aware of one colleague, a property lawyer, using an AI contract analysis tool to discover a hidden clause in a land dispute case. I also know a lawyer who was facing an overwhelming amount of evidence in an environmental law claim and used an AI-powered document review. It sifted through thousands of documents, pinpointing key evidence that ultimately secured a substantial settlement for the client.
To date, the fastest adopters of generative AI in the legal profession have been lawyers working in-house for large companies, with 17% using the technology, according to legal analytics giant LexisNexis. Law firms are not far behind, with around 12% to 13% using the technology. In-house teams may be
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