Artificial Intelligence - A Menace To The Legal Profession

Author: LawSphereX

Category: Technology, Cyber & Privacy

Published: 2026-08-23T18:11:36.240832+00:00

Updated: 2026-08-26T17:12:04.912+00:00

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE - A MENACE TO THE LEGAL

PROFESSION?

Jayadeep P.J. & M.C. Kiruthiga, LLM (Taxation), Government Law College Coimbatore

ABSTRACT

Ever since the term “Artificial intelligence” (hereinafter mentioned as AI) was coined, the innovations involving it have been massive, benefiting almost every industry and profession. While we reap the fruits of the use of AI in our day to day lives, especially in the legal practice, it is fair to say that it can also act as a threat. This is especially when it is capable of doing everything a legal practitioner can do, if not in a more exquisite and effortless manner. While the use of AI can be used in such a manner that it can give a competitive advantage, the traditional practitioners with high knowledge and expertise in the field of law are the biggest victims of this downside of advancement of AI. They are deeply bothered and distressed when the usage of AI is being imposed on them and when they are not able to make efficient use of it.

How the blossoming of the AI in legal profession can cause an apprehension, has neither been realized nor been studied for benefit maximization. Careful measures are to be taken by the practitioners in understanding the use and powers of AI not only for taking a competitive edge but also for mere survival. Apart from comprehending the usage of it, the degree of applicability and cautions to be taken are still putting us lawyers into the state of bewilderment. This study explores and examines the areas and roles of a legal practitioner which have already seen the advent of AI, the impact, the efficiency it can provide and more importantly how far is it from replacing the practitioners themselves.

The study also emphasizes on the advancements in AI brought in multiple other countries known for their strong legal systems, their success and failures, and the possibilities of incorporation of the same in a country like India. Various tools, techniques and software used in the legal profession around the world have been analyzed in this paper. The authors have also thrown light on various real time occasions, instances and the judicial views on various such circumstances when there has been a difficulty among the legal practitioners in adapting to impose rules involving AI. The findings reveal that there are not much roles of a legal practitioner that a computer cannot do and that is something that every legal practitioner should be really concerned about. Keywords: artificial intelligence, threat, tools, around the world, legal profession

Introduction: Artificial Intelligence at one point was merely a fantasy and a science fiction element, but now has already started becoming a reality. We are at that stage where large AI models are built, which can perform a lot of things, and this is just the beginning and is something that is going to keep seeing major advancements till the very end of man’s life. Ten years ago, it would have been tough to even foresee something like the advent of ChatGPT1, but now it has taken the world by storm. With AI now being in the spotlight, it is clear that it is going to keep seeing some rapid changes. The concept of a machine acting as your assistant and communicating with you on a human level will undoubtedly continue to advance2. Similarly, the AI is now capable of performing the tasks of a paralegal and is not that far from performing every task of a law expert.

AI is now transforming the traditional practices legal profession by includingtasks such as document reviewing, legal research thus improving efficiency and accuracy. AI tools now help in collecting mammoth data enhancing the ability to predict case outcomes and to draft legal documents. Tasks of a Legal Practitioner, now performed by Artificial Intelligence: With AI being the most predominant and most worked upon area concerning the field of Science and technology, its growth is tremendous that there are not many areas that are not touched upon. Especially in field of law, the works of a lawyer, to a great degree the paralegals which do not require much legal knowledge are simplified and more efficiently done with very little room for any error.

There, undeniably, are multiple areas where mistakes still persist, but there is nothing that cannot be worked upon or eliminated in the near future. Some of the major tasks and works that now AI is capable of performing are,

1. Legal Research Made Easy

2. Machine- A better counselor?

3. Predictive analysis is now not an issue

1ChatGPT, https://chatgpt.com/(last visited Sept. 29, 2024) 2Magnus Stenaa Jensen, Development of AI Happens Faster Than Ever, but How Far Have We Come?, DTU (Sept. 29, 2024, 7:50 PM), https://www.dtu.dk/english/newsarchive/2024/03/development-happens-faster-thanever-but-how-far-have-we-come

4. Case filing is now a task done online

5. Legal work management- no longer a manual job

Legal Research Made Easy Gone are the times when legal practitioners had to spend hours together in libraries to physically and manually go through tons of books and journals to collect legal data, be it legislation or any judicial authority. Now every legal data can be accessed in no time from anywhere with just a click of a button. All that is now required is a good network connection and an electronic device to use it. Although this saves a huge amount of time for the legal practitioners, the dependency that has so far been on them is so much diminished as this very data is now accessible to everyone with the minimal know-how of the algorithm of such legal research assisting tools. Some major examples include Case-text3, an AI search tool, that provides legal data to not only legal practitioners but also to legal enthusiasts in the U. S.

In addition, it uses CARA AI, an artificial technology that can deliver results that are relevant to the context of the document uploaded by the user4. Apart from that, Harvey AI5, another AI product used in the U. S. , has made things easier in the world of law. It is a specifically tailored AI tool that allows the user to access legal data and can even break down technical jargon into easily understandable terms6. Similar tools are used in India as well which includes SCC Online7, providing powerful search features and allowing the users to easily access and print legal resources published in its online journal, providing great authenticity and is now submitted by lawyers in all courts of law in India8. Very similar to this is the AIROnline9, a widely used online reported in India. 3CaseText, https://casetext. com/ (last visited Sept. 29, 2024) 4Valerie McConnell, What is CARA A. I.

and how do I useit? , Casetext, (Sept 17,2024, 2:30 am), https://help. casetext. com/en/articles/1971642-what-is-cara-a-i-and-how-do-i-use-it 5HarveyAI, https://www. harvey. ai/ (last visited Sept. 29, 2024) 6Christopher Jan Benitez and Chintan Zalani, Harvey AI: The Legal AI tool to watch out for, On The Map, (Sept. 17,2024, 3:54 am), https://www. onthemap. com/blog/harvey-ai/ 7SCCOnline, https://www. scconline. com/(last visited Sept. 29, 2024) 8https://ebc. co. in/scc-online-web-edition/(last visited Sept. 29, 2024) 9AIROnline, https://www. aironline. in/(last visited Sept. 29, 2024)

With these requiring the users to subscribe to their plans, Indian Kanoon10 offers a free platform for the users to access legal information and content on Indian law. With not just the ability to access and collect legal data, the AI using e-discovery software like Autonomy and Clearwell’s software has an immense and wide range of powers, that it can now analyze the documents in no time with very affordable pricing. Clearwell’s software can analyze and sort very large legal documents and a real-time example was that a legal firm was once able to manage and analyze 570,000 documents in two days using it. The founder of Autonomy, Mike Lynch predicted that “legal is a sector that will likely employ fewer, not more, people in the U. S. in the future.

”11 One astounding development in recent times, not just helpful in the field of law, but to everyone in general, is the introduction of ChatGPT, a chatbot that uses natural language processing to create human like conversational dialogue, which uses specialized algorithms that retrieve large data as response12. This generative AI can summarize, analyze, solve, and even draft, which when thought about are all the fundamental skills of a paralegal. Although this astonishing advancement has been a major asset to the world, it has its own set of drawbacks but is still a negligible one. The most common error that this chatbot has come up with in the field of law is the problem called ‘AI Hallucinations’, where the citations generated are just made up completely lacking any authenticity.

Trying to promote the cautious use of AI, the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit proposed an amendment to 5th Cir. Rule 32. 3 and Form 6, requiring the legal practitioners to submit a certificate that no generative AI is used and even if used is done with caution by reviewing the citations and legal analysis do derived. But earlier this year, after taking into regard the public comments and a careful analysis of AI’s impact in the legal field, the court decided not to adopt the proposed rule13. The use of ChatGPT is not limited to the litigants, but also to the judges to make informed decisions. Although the judges do not use it to express an opinion on case merits it is used to gain a broader understanding of the jurisprudence and its application in various 10Indian Kanoon, https://indiankanoon. org/(last visited Sept.

29, 2024) 11John Markoff, Armies of Expensive Lawyers, Replaced by Cheaper Software, The New York Times(Sept. 17, 2024, 1:53 pm),https://www. nytimes. com/2011/03/05/science/05legal. html 12Amanda Hetler,What Is ChatGPT? , Techtarget (Sept. 17, 2024, 2:16 PM), https://www. techtarget. com/whatis/definition/ChatGPT. 13Brandt Leibe, Emily R Apte, Kassi Burns, U. S. Fifth Circuit Decides Against Its Proposed Rule Amendment on AI Use in Legal Filings, King and Spalding, (Sept. 18,2024, 5. 20 pm), https://www. kslaw. com/attachments/000/011/823/original/ca061424. pdf

situations. One such instance was when the Punjab and Haryana High Court used ChatGPT to gain a better and wider understanding of bail jurisprudence and also made it clear that ChatGPT does not express an opinion on the case's merits, and the trial court will not consider these comments14. The U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts, in a year-end report, while cautioning the legal practitioners about the possibility of facing the problem of AI Hallucination, stated that although through AI, there is increased access to vital information, there always runs a risk of dehumanization of law. He wrote that "But with equal confidence, I predict that judicial work - particularly at the trial level - will be significantly affected by

AI."15

ChatGPT’s introduction into the legal department has brought in more flaws is not an incorrect statement, but the same has also brought with it more fruits than challenges, especially by aiding in legal research, one of the most needed abilities of a law professional. Machine- A better counselor? One trait that a machine has, that we as humans can never have is the capability of not being judgmental. They incapacity makes it easier for the clients to open up without any hesitation and get solutions tailored accordingly. An advocate, not just within the courtroom, with great effort has the duty to represent his clients by, in detail, knowing what, how, and why they want it. A good advocate has to find such laws and facts that can be analyzed and used in the client’s situation or scenario presented before him.

It is the legal practitioner’s role, through legal opinion, to get the client out of any hairy situation, be it in terms of ownership or rights- related property issues or guiding through issues related to labour or financial laws. The legal practitioner while providing legal opinion acts as a counselor by being a trusted confidante and a pair of ears to listen and comprehend the clients’ problems16. 14Jaswinder Singh v. State of Punjab & Anr. , CRM-M-22496-2022 (Punjab & Haryana HC).

152023 Year-End Report on the Federal Judiciary, U.S. Supreme Court (Sept. 18, 2024, 5:42 PM),

https://www.supremecourt.gov/publicinfo/year-end/2023year-endreport.pdf. 16The Lawyer as Counselor, ADLI Law Group (Sept. 28, 2024, 12:39 PM), https://adlilaw.com/the-lawyer-ascounselor/.

Now with all this being said, AI has developed so much that these functions can be done by the work of certain algorithms that can simply read the fed-in data for anxiety and can accordingly provide suggestions and directions accordingly to make the best out of any situation. AI therapists are advanced programs and digital marvels that can even promote mental health by stimulating conversations and interactions. There are now more than 40 mental health chat bots globally, according to the International Journal of Medical Informatics. One such personal chatbot is the Earkick17 which aims at improving mental health by providing necessary and personalized insights. Some shreds of evidence suggest that AI can provide Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT) through which a person’s symptoms of stress and depression can be reduced.

18 AI playing the role of therapist can provide numerous advantages including 24/7 availability, tailor-made treatments, high accessibility, less intervention and in reduced social stigma19. These aforementioned tools, when can provide directions to overcome stress and mental problems, a few existing tools and the tools that are to come in the future can definitely provide legal opinions and custom-made solutions to legal problems as well Predictive analysis is now not an issue Today’s AI algorithm can foresee outcomes and predict the future by analyzing past data and present trends20. These programs are designed in such a way that they can read and analyse contracts, flag important clauses, and provide a list of possible threats which can help in litigation avoidance21.

Determining bail outcome is possible through machine learning (ML) as it can read vast and mammoth data looking for a pattern and can come up with the risk report based on the severity of the crime and the accused’s history report. Deep learning (DL), a subset of ML can 17Earkick, https://earkick. com/ (last visited Sept. 29, 2024) 18Jamie Ducharme,Can AI Chatbots Ever Replace Human Therapists? , Time (Sept. 28, 2024, 1:48 AM), https://time. com/6320378/ai-therapy-chatbots/ 19AI Therapy: Can Robots Be Your Next Therapist? Benefits, Challenges, and What You Need to Know, The Mind Therapy (Sept. 28, 2024, 2:00 AM), https://themindtherapy. in/the-role-of-ai-therapists-in-mental-healthbenefits-challenges-and-implications/ 20Predictive Models: Future Insights from Past Data, Demandbase, https://www. demandbase. com/blog/predictive-models-future-insights-from-past-data/ (last visited Sept.

29, 2024). 21Use of Artificial Intelligence in Legal Practice, British Institute of International and Comparative Law (Sept.

28, 2024, 2:55 AM),

https://www.biicl.org/documents/170_use_of_artificial_intelligence_in_legal_practice_final.pdf.

analyse legal texts and judicial decisions which are capable of predicting flight risks a major part of the bail determination system. 22 Even for determining if an offender is to be let out on parole, there are tools to determine the risk of recidivism, on a scale of one to ten, like the COMPAS used in USA by judges, parole officers and lawyers. LexMachina23 is one other tool in the USA, and its major role is to anticipate the behaviour of courts, judges, lawyers, and parties using legal analytics.

Case filing is now a task done online The e-filing system, brought into the legal side of India, very recently, is now being used to file and upload documents at various stages of a case in both civil and criminal matters, before district and high courts The e-court services24 allows the users to file new cases, upload pleadings, check the status, file applications, and record oath along with providing online ready- made templates and online payment features. This not only allows the users to save money, paper, time, and travel of advocates and clients but also obviates the necessity to physically appear in courts. This now allows entire filing to be done in asynchronous mode without the need for an Advocate25.

With the Bombay High Court, at the end of the year 2023, suggesting that laptops or iPads are to be provided to Assistant Public Prosecutors (APPs)so that e-filing can be made seamless, simply shows how much of a significance the system of e-filing holds. While hearing a bail petition, the APP was asked if there were provisions available to him to make e-filings and that was when the said Honourable court came to know that such provisions were not available to him. "To make the mechanism of e-filing effective, it is essential that APPs are provided with the facility of laptops/ iPads at the earliest," the High Court bench observed. 26 22Ramadugu Shanmuk & Ankush Kumar,Fairness on Bail Determination: Can AI Tools Be Trusted with Bail Decisions? , Jurists Junction (Sept. 28, 2024, 3:39 AM), https://juristsjunction.

in/2024/04/27/fairness-on-baildetermination-can-ai-tools-be-trusted-with-bail-decisions/. 23Lex Machina, https://lexmachina. com/ (last visited Sept. 29, 2024). 24eCourts, https://ecourts. gov. in/ecourts_home/ (last visited Sept. 29, 2024). 25About E-Filing, National Informatics Centre (Sept. 28, 2024, 1:28 PM), https://www. nic. in/wpcontent/uploads/2023/04/eFiling. pdf. 26To Make E-Filing Mechanism Effective, It’s Essential to Make Laptops, iPads Available to Prosecutors: Bombay HC, MSN (Sept. 28, 2023), https://www. msn. com/en-in/news/India/to-make-e-filing-mechanismeffective-it-s-essential-to-make-laptops-ipads-available-to-prosecutors-bombay-hc/ar-AA1jFcB0.

On April 15, 2024, the Supreme Court, on the fact that there was a lack of a permanent bench of the Allahabad High Court in the Western zone of the state since 1950,posing significant obstacles for litigants and lawyers in accessing justice, directed that e-filing capacity should be available to all districts courts of Uttar Pradesh through e-Sewa Kendras. Such direction was made to the Registrar General of the Allahabad High Court to comply with the same within two weeks from the date of order27. Delhi High Court while passing a series of directions to make e-filing in district courts robust, also directed the implementation of a centralized filing system and to initiated steps to make e-filing mandatory in all civil and criminal courts.

28 The main purpose of this direction is the courts’ observation that over 7,50,000 cases were ready to be weeded out, and such action was necessary to create more physical space in court and records rooms29. One thing, with all these cases and decisions prioritizing e-filing in courts, that is clear is the fact that the whole E-filing procedure is to be made completely mandatory in every court in the near future, which reduces the dependency on a lawyer, as it was once a major task which only lawyers could do efficiently. Legal work management- no longer a manual job Managing multiple cases at a time, and keeping track of every stage of a case, so in short, multitasking and effective management of work is where a good lawyer shines. These functions are now aided and, in the future can be taken over, by AI.

These menial tasks are performed with ease by the tools and software that are still undergoing major developments. Earlier the legal practitioners noted down every stage of the case in a physical case diary maintained by them, and the relevant dates can be observed by them only through a rigid procedure. Now various tools and software are available to them, through which notes and dates are marked which also allows the users to set reminders digitally. Google calendar is one 27Md Anas Chaudhary v. Registrar-General, High Court of Judicature at Allahabad, W. P. (C) No. 001429/2023 (India). 28HC Calls for Robust E-Filing, Digitising of Case Records in City’s District Courts, Times of India (Sept. 28, 2024, 10:37 PM), https://timesofindia. indiatimes. com/city/delhi/delhi-high-court-calls-for-robust-e-filing-anddigitisation-of-case-records-in-district-courts/articleshow/106681640. cms.

29Karan S. Thukral v. District & Sessions Judge, 2024 SCC OnLine Del 94; Simranjeet, Strengthen E-Filing, Streamline Weeding Out and Digitization of Disposed of Record: Delhi High Court, SCCOnline (Sept. 28, 2024, 10:43 PM), https://www. scconline. com/blog/post/2024/01/10/strengthen-efiling-streamline-weeding-outdigitization-of-disposed-of-record-dhc-legal-news/.

such application software that comes with nifty features that have simplified scheduling which is one the most important integral tasks of a legal practitioner. This tool allows all the members of a legal team to coordinate and access the details about the case, most importantly the next date of hearing. Reminders can be set for cases with higher important status or stages. Applications such as the E-court Services India30, provides information concerning the cases filed in District and High Courts in India. The search of information is made easy through options like Search by CNR, Case Status, Cause List, calendar, and My Cases. In the UK, the UK Ministry of Justice came up with the Crown Court Digital Case System (“CCDCS”, commonly shortened to “DCS”), a web-based platform that is used to print off the case documents that have been uploaded in it.

The main reason for coming up with such a platform is case management. Conclusion: A big relief for the legal practitioners now is that the AI we have today lacks the innate

ability to learn, explore and grow individually, thus not having the capacity to take independent decisions and actions. They need someone to fetch the data, command and algorithm required, some of which doesn’t require lawyers per se. This does not allow the practitioners to be negligent about the same. The advancement of AI has indicated the necessity of the legal practitioners to part ways with rigid traditional legal practices and focus more on acquiring technical know-how and the workings of various tools and its algorithms. The legal practitioners on their part will have to learn to adapt to this AI dominant world, and will have to know to efficiently use them to gain any sort of competitive advantage.

Through this paper it is clear that there are various tools that can perform various tasks, especially the menial ones, that a lawyer performs which is an indicator that we are not too far from seeing AI take over the legal profession. 30eCourts India, https://services. ecourts. gov. in/ecourtindia_v6/ (last visited Sept. 29, 2024)