Supreme court justice calls out lawyer for citing AI-generated 'phantom rulings'
Supreme Court Justice Kanfi-Steinitz exposes a lawyer's use of artificial intelligence to fabricate legal precedents, highlighting growing concerns about AI's misuse in Israel's legal system.
A petitioner’s attorney quoted “rulings that never existed, strongly suggesting that the petitioner’s representative used artificial intelligence” in a case, Justice Gila Canfy-Steinitz of the Supreme Court said in her ruling on Sunday night.
The case involved a petition filed against a decision by the Sharia Court, which deals with family law according to Muslim law.
While the rulings are confidential, Canfy-Steinitz wanted to address the phenomenon of lawyers using artificial intelligence in her ruling.
All technology has its disadvantages
The petition was ultimately rejected, but not before Canfy-Steinitz warned against the irresponsible use of AI by lawyers who rely on it when writing legal arguments.
“Like any technology, this one also has disadvantages and risks that pose a new challenge to the legal world, one of which is the use of information input into artificial intelligence tools without verifying its reliability,” she wrote.
Justice Canfy-Steinitz wrote that the ruling should be published due to the growing phenomenon of lawyers using artificial intelligence tools.