In today’s legal world, artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning are playing an increasingly important role in how lawyers do their job. In this series of articles, initially published in The Global Legal Post, Paul Longhurst of 3Kites and Richard Kemp of Kemp IT Law examine the impact of AI on the legal profession and the potential challenges it presents for law firms.
Paul Longhurst writes that while AI can’t replace experienced lawyering, it can be immensely helpful when reviewing large amounts of information to establish patterns and identify content that relates to specific matters. He further explains that there are tools that can be tailored to specific tasks and some tools, such as ChatGPT, even generate plausible yet incorrect and nonsensical answers. However, he cautions that it would be difficult to offer clients advice that could be wrong.
He stresses that AI tools and human intelligence should be combined to take advantage of both and recommends that smaller firms should take advantage of proven technology that already exists. That said, he advocates for caution as AI still has much to learn, as shown by the pioneering trajectory of Lyons Electronic Office in 1951, who had their moment of glory but did not benefit from their invention in the end.
Richard Kemp advises firms to think carefully about their use of AI and carefully consider the practical and regulatory implications. He suggests that firms should ensure that their use of AI complies with GDPR and the firm’s code of conduct, take into account any commitments the firm’s clients have imposed in regard to IT and security, and look at their client agreements to determine how they should protect their own IP.
The article then closes with a reminder of the importance of keeping the length of the article from the original article, emphasizing the requests at the start.
This article was written by 3Kites, a company that develops and delivers AI-powered automated document investigation and process automation tools for the legal sector, and Kemp IT Law, a specialist in legal services for the tech sector. 3Kites specialises in providing customised tools designed to help law firms identify commitments, contracts that roll over, and much more quickly and accurately. Kemp IT Law has many years of experience in not only advising clients on technology-related legal matters, but also supporting law firms on regulatory, contractual and IP issues.
