Artificial Intelligence

The following text is provided as a template for courts, service-delivery organizations, or others who may wish to develop public education materials for court users who are considering using AI. This model text has been adapted from the Action Committee on Modernizing Court Operations’ guidance on Demystifying AI and Use of AI by Court Users – organizations may wish to build upon it to reference the specific services, programs, and practices in their jurisdiction.

This guidance is provided for information and to support risk mitigation in the use of AI by court users. It is not an endorsement by the Action Committee of the use of AI, or any particular AI tool. Organizations who adapt this template may wish to include a similar disclaimer indicating that, by providing this guidance, they are not endorsing either any particular AI tool or the use of AI by court users more generally.

What is Artificial Intelligence?

Artificial intelligence (AI) is a term used to describe technology that can do things normally done by human beings. This includes understanding language, learning, making art, and solving complicated problems.

Challenges and Risks

AI can help lawyers and courts do things more efficiently and help people who do not have lawyers find the information they need to resolve a case, but it is important to be careful when using AI, and to only use it if you can do so responsibly. The court where you are appearing might have rules about how you can use AI, or whether you have to let them know if you used it. Risks can include:

Confusion about what AI can do: If you don’t understand how a tool works or what it is supposed to do, you could end up using it in ways that will create mistakes.
Changes to how AI works: AI tools change quickly. This makes it hard to keep up with what tools are available and how they can be safely used. Remember that tools that are not made for legal purposes might make more mistakes when you use them to prepare for court.
Wrong information: AI tools can make up false information (sometimes called hallucination). An example of this is inventing legal decisions that do not exist. AI tools that “learned” about the law using information that contains stereotypes can produce results that are biased against groups who experienced, and may continue to experience, discrimination. Since it is not always possible to understand how an AI tool came up with its results, it can be hard to review them and make sure they are correct, especially if you used AI to create an entirely new document, like a court submission. This is called the black box problem.

Tips for Using AI

AI tools can help you do many different things; however, it is important to have a human check their results, especially if they are used to create something entirely new. Some AI tools make it easier for you to review their work by giving you a list of links for checking the information included in its result.

An AI tool that was developed with legal experts specifically for court users will be more reliable than a tool that is intended for general use. If your case involves Indigenous or other minority communities, try to find a culturally-sensitive AI tool.

It is important you understand how your privacy will be protected and how the company that owns or created the AI tool could use any information you give it. There maybe a bigger risk the company will use your information inappropriately if the tool is free or you did not have to sign a contract with the company to use it.

How is AI used in Court Processes?

People involved in the court can use AI tools they access on common electronic devices like cellphones and personal computers or through the internet in different ways. If you are going to use AI for your court process, it is important to use it responsibly. The tips and risks outlined in this document will help you to do this.

You might use AI to:

Find court decisions that apply to your situation.
Study documents like court decisions, laws and regulations to help you understand how they apply to your case.
Review all the documents you need to give to the other party involved in your case or that they give you. This is really useful if there are a lot of documents.
Translate court websites and communications or case law.
Help with mediation and arbitration outside of court. Online mediation tools that build in AI can help find common ground, create settlement proposals, and come to a solution that both sides agree with.

The court or your lawyer might also use AI. It can be useful to:

Help courts manage their work by making administrative processes like scheduling faster and easier or identifying patterns to understand where they might need more money or people to do their work.
Transcribe information from audio to text. A court could use this technology to produce unofficial written records of court processes.
Help court staff who work with the public provide better and faster services by making it easier for them to find useful information.
Help support you or your lawyer. Lawyers might use AI tools to help find useful advice or connect you to the resources and legal support services you need. If your lawyer is going to use AI to identify information for you, AI tools developed by legal experts are the best option, where available. You should also make sure they double-check all the information is correct and true.

Chatbots and Other AI Tools you may have heard of

The following are examples of AI tools court users sometimes use to help them prepare for court. A court user should be careful if they use any of these tools, though, because they were not developed by legal experts.

A chatbot is a computer program that can communicate as if it were a human. Most chatbots now use AI. They can answer questions, summarize information, and write new material. You might use them to help with research, review documents, and study legal issues.

ChatGPT is the most well-known chatbot. Besides answering questions like a human, it can create text, new images, videos, and audio. GPT means “Generative Pretrained Transformer”. GPT is a type of neural network AI model: this means it is a series of algorithms (or instructions) designed to work like a human brain. ChatGPT was developed by the American company OpenAI and launched in 2022.

Google Gemini is another popular chatbot. It was developed by Google and launched in March 2023. Because it works with Google’s search engine, it can provide links to Google search results to help you check that it gives you correct information.

Microsoft’s Copilot, launched in 2023, is another AI tool with a chatbot function. It is included in Microsoft programs like Office, PowerPoint, Excel, Microsoft’s search engine Bing, and the Windows operating system.

You might also use a writing assistance program that incorporates AI. These programs can write text, edit or translate existing documents, or make a document like a letter or court submission sound more formal.

Grammarly can help with writing by checking for spelling and grammar as well as drafting documents.

DeepL is an AI translation tool that uses neural networks to imitate the way a human does translation but at a much faster pace. This can produce a more natural, human-like translation.

If you want to learn more, you can read the Action Committee on Modernizing Court Operations’ information for judges on Demystifying AI and the use of AI by Court Users.