ABSTRACT
In the Present realm of technology and AI Advancement, it is a well-known fact that, Artificial Intelligence is increasingly evolving in various aspects of any society, including healthcare, finance, entertainment, transportation, education, and so on. This includes the Law sector as well, wherein careful considerations and regulations have to be made. The involvement of AI in the legal sector has made law shape its development in a unique manner, however, presenting a different set of challenges for the legal systems around the world. In other words, there have been tremendous growth of technologies which uprooted various convenient legal structures, resulting in their status quo to be modified. This Article brings out the importance and legal and ethical implications of AI, with regard to the present time.
Keywords: Artificial Intelligence, Technology, Legal Implications, Ethical Implications
AI IN LEGAL SECTOR FOR IPR
Some crucial sectors involve Legal services modified by AI, Laws regarding IPR being modified by AI which includes laws regarding Patent protection and Copyright. Besides, there are instances where legal professionals use AI-powered tools for various tasks. Though adoption of AI has increased, as a result for a need of efficiency, accuracy and cost-effectiveness, the use of AI for drafting purposes, contract reviewing and so on, claims to deliver greater access to justice and enhance decision making. But, whether there exist any ethical and legal implications of the same is a question to be researched upon.
The integration of AI technologies have raised various significant challenges to the present legal frameworks. While the traditional laws have to keep pace with the ongoing and increasing advancements in AI, such actions lead to ambiguity and concerns on accountability and ethical standards. Therefore, regulations must be introduced such that, they address the challenges of both legal and ethical implications due to AI usage.
One of the most significant points to make note of is that, as AI evolves increasingly, there are new challenges that keep on arising. One such challenge is with regard to the attribution of liability on results / outcomes produced by AI. Herein, as AI Algorithms create works including art / painting, music, literature and so on, issues arise on their copyright ownership and authorship. Furthermore, the current copyright laws attribute ownership only to human beings, as creators of works and not to AI, thus raising concerns on the same again.
AI inventions are challenging the legal sphere of inventorship and patentability. For instance, Dr. Thalers invention DABUS, is an Artificial intelligence which is capable of inventing new technologies. However, the legal framework of UK and USA denied its claim of commissioning the invention to DABUS under their respective laws. Moreover, in Stephen Thaler v. Katherine K. Vidal (2021) decided by US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, while upholding the orders of lower courts and patent offices, held that it is immensely clear, both from the plain text of patent law and the larger context of patent jurisdiction in US, that inventorship is granted only to a human-being, and not even an artificial person can claim the same, even though its capable to infringe it. The same approach is followed in UK.
However, the South African Office of Patents granted patent to DABUS’s invention, thus reigniting the non-uniformity and challenge to conventional legal wisdom of intellectual property law, which emanates from statue itself. The Indian law also seems analogous to jurisdictions of UK and US.
Similarly, under the Copyright Law in India, there is no mention of capacity of Artificial Intelligence to be an author, and given the prohibition to secure copyright other than what the 1957 Act provides under section 16 of the said Act, it would be practically impossible for AI to secure copyright. However, currently, the problems of infringement of Copyrighted works by AI lack any remedial provisions under the Act, which makes the legal rights of authors devoid of any specific remedies if and when AI will copy it. Thus authors can become vulnerable in terms of whom to sue in case of AI infringement of someone’s work, in addition to the question of subsequently, vesting the liability on either the owner of AI for AI’s actions, owning to an absence of jurisprudence in that area.
Additionally, due to a rapid evolution of AI technology in the legal sector and lack of development of comprehensive legal frameworks, it has left the policymakers in dilemma, on the effective governing of the use of AI in the legal domain. Though there are IP Issues as stated earlier, there are other significant challenges such as data privacy, liability for AI-generated errors, and so on. Despite these challenges and uncertainties, it is still believed that AI can bring a change in the legal profession, the would develop future immensely. It has the potential to bridge the gap between legal experts and general public, thus enhancing the efficiency and effectiveness of the legal process.
LEGAL DISPARITIES ON OTHER ISSUES WITH REGARD TO AI
Further to the above concerns, there is a possibility of legal disparities if the AI systems are trained on biased datasets or programmed with flawed algorithms, inadvertently discriminating certain groups, leading to unjust outcomes. Additionally, the increasing pace of technological advancement presents challenges for framing of legal regulations, thus struggling to keep in pace with evolving technology.
While there have been questions surrounding liability, accountability, and data privacy for AI-generated decisions, there is a stringent requirement of legal scholars to deal with the complex issues of intersection of law and technology, and highly emphasize on principles including confidentiality, competency, fairness, transparency, unbiasedness, justice etc. It is necessary that legal practitioners have a responsibility to ensure ethical use of AI, in compliance with legal and professional standards.
USE OF AI IN THE CORPORATE REALM
There are various concerns on the use of AI in the modern legal practice. This includes firstly, the use of AI for contract review purposes, wherein, AI is used for the purpose of transforming and summarizing the vast amounts of data with ease and thus, covering even those nuances that may not be caught with a human’s eye. For instance, in the task of contract reviewing AI helps in the scanning of documents, and answering the inconsistencies present, thus enhancing efficiency, and accuracy.
Secondly, AI has such predictive skills that may help a legal professional in forecasting the outcomes of a case. Such skills helps not only for legal research, but also for the analysis of historical data present, predict the relevant patters and predict future judicial rulings with accuracy.
Thirdly, AI helps in the drafting of contracts, wherein, certain tools can be used for filtering mistakes, guiding on editing, and integrate software such as the of Microsoft Word, for a streamlined workflow. Lastly, it is necessary that, there is an element of transparency and accountability while using AI, especially because of the fact that, AI has been crafted by human, and if left unchecked, the same can lead to the denial of justice to people.
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WRITTEN BY: THANUJA ANTHIYUR ARAVINDAN
REFERENCES
- LiveLaw, AI And The Legal Landscape: Embracing Innovation, Addressing Challenges <https://www.livelaw.in/lawschool/articles/law-and-ai-ai-powered-tools-general-data-protection-regulation-250673#:~:text=The%20use%20of%20AI%20raises,concerns%20about%20individual%20privacy%20rights>.
- Mondaq, “The Rise Of AI In The Legal Arena: Opportunities, Challenges & The Way Forward”.
- In-House Counsel, the Adoption of Artificial Intelligence, and Legal Ethics, Indian Journal of Law and Technology <https://repository.nls.ac.in/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1108&context=ijlt>.
- Oxford, Artificial intelligence in the legal sector: pressures and challenges of transformation, <https://academic.oup.com/cjres/article/13/1/135/5716343>.
