Description
The use of artificial intelligence is not some distant prospect. Many of the tools lawyers use today – online research platforms that suggest other areas for research, software packages that help complete forms or propose or assemble language, and discovery tools that sort through documents – are driven by artificial intelligence.
These and other AI engineered legal tools raise substantial ethical issues.
- Are they the unauthorized practice of law?
- Have lawyers researched their capabilities such that they are competent to use them?
- How must lawyers supervise their use by non-lawyer staff?
This program provides a guide to ethics issues when using software and other technology tools based on AI in law practice.
- What duties do lawyers have to investigate and understand AI in the tools they use?
- Does AI constitute the unauthorized practice of law (UPL) in a state?
- Do software packages that draft language and assemble forms violate ethics rules?
- What supervisory and training obligations do lawyers have for non-lawyer staff using these tools?
- Are there ethics concerns of using AI in discovery?
- Must lawyers warn clients that they use AI?