COURSE DESCRIPTION
The use of artificial intelligence and machine learning in law practice are not far off prospects, but rather accomplished realities. 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 document language, and discovery tools that sort through documents – are driven by artificial intelligence and machine learning. 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 will provide you with a practical guide to the substantial ethical issues arising from the use of common law practice tools that use artificial intelligence and machine learning.
· Ethical issues in the use of artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning 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 form assembly and language drafting software packages 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
Speaker:
Thomas E. Spahn is of counsel in the Tysons Corners, Virginia office of McGuireWoods, where he advises firm clients on professional responsibility issues and properly creating and preserving the attorney-client privilege and work product protections. He has served on the ABA Standing Committee on Ethics and Professional Responsibility and is a Member of the American Law Institute and a Fellow of the American Bar Foundation. He has written extensively on attorney-client privilege, ethics and other topics, and has spoken at over 2200 CLE programs throughout the U.S. and in several foreign countries. Through links on his website biography, he has made available to the public his summaries of over 1,600 Virginia and ABA legal ethics opinions, organized by topic; a 300 page summary of his two-volume 1,500 page book on the attorney-client privilege and work product doctrine; over 1100 weekly email alerts about privilege and work product cases; and materials for 40 ethics programs on numerous topics, totaling over 9,000 pages of analysis.