If you end up in a UK court, a robot could help decide your legal fate. The UK Justice Office on Tuesday issued guidance allowing judges to use ChatGPT and other artificial intelligence tools to write legal rulings and perform several other tasks.
"The use of artificial intelligence ('AI') across society is increasing, and its relevance to the courts and tribunal systems is increasing," the Office of Justice, which oversees judges, magistrates and court panel members in England and Wales, said in a statement. "This guidance is the first step in a proposed series of future work to support the judiciary's engagement with artificial intelligence."
This shift may come as a surprise to those who have been watching artificial intelligence lurch into our various legal systems. Earlier this year, two New York attorneys were fined $5,000 after submitting legal documents written by ChatGPT in which artificial intelligence made up citations and citations. In October, convicted Fugees rapper Prakazrel "Pras" Michél said his former lawyer botched his trial with closing arguments written by artificial intelligence.
But reports of the potential dangers of artificial intelligence haven’t stopped lawyers and other officials from diving headfirst into the technology.
This is particularly evident in the UK, where judges appear to be interested in the technology. In September, Lord Justice Birss of the Court of Appeal of England and Wales used ChatGPT to summarize a legal theory with which he was unfamiliar and copy-pasted the results into a formal ruling. Birss called artificial intelligence a "very useful" tool.
While the Office of Justice acknowledges the potential pitfalls of artificial intelligence, the guidance clears the way for UK judges to try to use the technology.
The justice agency noted that AI responses "may be inaccurate, incomplete, misleading, or biased," and suggested that ChatGPT and other large language models "are a poor way to conduct research to discover new information that cannot be verified." The guidance also recommends that judges check the accuracy of AI responses before making decisions that change the course of people's lives. This is indeed a good idea.
The guidance also warns about privacy concerns, noting that AI companies collect the results of user interactions. The Justice Office said judges should assume that typing something into a chatbot interface is equivalent to making it public.
Overall, the 6-page guidance document provides basic details about the technology, and it is clear that the judiciary believes that some judges have zero understanding of artificial intelligence. Given the huge stakes, you have to wonder if it's a good idea to have judges go crazy using artificial intelligence to guide their new robotic gavels in less than 2,000 words.