Future Law and the Legal System
- [US Capitol - National Law Review]
Security, Privacy, and Innovation
- Overview
The law touches every corner of the business world. Almost everything a company does—sales, purchases, partnerships, mergers, reorganizations—is through legally binding contracts. Without a sound intellectual property law system, innovation will stagnate. Every day, whether we admit it or not, each of us operates within the context of our legal system and the implied possibility of litigation.
The global legal services market is close to one trillion (US) dollars and is one of the largest in the world. At the same time, it remains woefully under-digitized. For better or worse, the legal field is bound by tradition, and adoption of new technologies and tools has been very slow.
This is expected to change in the coming years. More than any technology before it, artificial intelligence (AI) will change the practice of law in dramatic ways. In fact, this process is already underway.
AI is a technology that allows computers to simulate the way humans think and solve problems. When combined with other technologies such as the Internet, sensors, and robotics, AI technology can perform tasks that typically require human input, such as operating vehicles, answering questions, or providing insights from large amounts of data.
Many of the most popular applications of AI rely on ML models, an area of AI that focuses specifically on data and algorithms.
ML is a key area of AI that uses data and algorithms to imitate the way humans learn, improving the accuracy of their answers over time. ML relies on decision-making processes to make predictions or classify information, error functions to evaluate the accuracy of its work, and large language models (LLMs) and model optimization processes to reduce the difference between known examples and model estimates.
The ML algorithm repeats this "evaluation and optimization" process until the model-defined threshold accuracy is met.
- Legal Innovation
Innovation exists in law as well. The law regulates and encourages other fields of innovation, but also devises its own innovations – it creates legal concepts, legal institutions, legal procedures, and legal technologies. Legal innovation usually arises from the need to regulate innovation outside the realm of law or from technological or social progress, but sometimes legal innovation is conceived, ex nihilo, within the law itself, and then goes on to influence reality.
The scientific branch of innovation research has not accorded much attention to the research of legal innovation perhaps because law is not, by nature, a technological or production industry. Jurists take an interest in new ideas introduced in law, but less so in the process of legal innovation. Nevertheless, legal innovation has similar characteristics to the innovation in other fields and it is influenced by innovation in other fields.
Legal innovation is not the result of a sudden flash of inspiration, but rather develops through a slow and gradual process. Its development generally reflects the mechanism that creates legal norms. The natural apprehension towards innovation exists in the field of law as well. The pace of legal innovation is accelerating, though it is not in sync with the tempo of technological innovation.
- The Future of Laws and Legal Systems
By 2030 we will see significant legal work being done by machines. As exponential growth of technology consumes to world, the legal industry is especially appetising. As a result, legal services will be fundamentally different than today in terms of both job function and the way legal services are provided.
The future of laws and legal systems will emphasize how future lawyers can and should anticipate or envision future legal impacts - including legislation, litigation, and corporate governance—of emerging technologies. Technology is coming to the law from many different angles, and it plays a key role in the new paradigm of legal services. To ignore technology and keep on doing business as usual is a huge risk for any lawyer.
The future of the legal industry will involve technology automating and assisting with standard repetitive work. Lawyers are going to realize that they need to step in up in terms of technology innovation in order to keep up with other industries that have been quick to accept new technologies.
If there’s one constant, it’s change. What once was will not always be. The Internet and social media have dramatically changed our jobs and how we interact. Technology has forever altered future law by furthering human rights and access to justice, while big data and analytics play an increasingly larger role in society in general and the legal world in particular.
- AI and Law
Artificial intelligence (AI) companies continue to find ways of developing technology that will manage laborious tasks in different industries for better speed and accuracy. In the legal profession, AI has already found its way into supporting lawyers and clients alike. The growing interest in applying AI in law is slowly transforming the profession and closing in on the work of paralegals, legal researchers, and litigators.
New breakthroughs in digital law are occurring on a daily basis as legal technology becomes the standard within law firms and in-house legal departments. Economic and technological forces are factoring into regulators’ responses and rulings as consumer law firms scramble to adapt -- and adopt best practices.
We don’t need to wait for the future; it’s already here. Our job is to stay on top of technology and harness its power to formulate laws that strengthen our country, serve and protect the populace and preserve respect for and adherence to the constitution.
By 2030 we will see significant legal work being done by machines. As exponential growth of technology consumes to world, the legal industry is especially appetising. As a result, legal services will be fundamentally different than today in terms of both job function and the way legal services are provided.
- [The Law Library, Munich, Germany - Maik]
- The Future of Courts - Remote Courts
Technology has invaded our professional and personal lives. The courts have not been immune to this invasion but rather are actively participating by maintaining court records electronically, enabling or even requiring electronic filing of pleadings and orders, and building high-tech courtrooms for evidence presentation.
Not all of these changes have occurred due to proactive decisions to modernize. Indeed, some have come about due to limitations on the old way of doing business and others because of convenience.
In the middle of March 2020, court buildings around the world began to close in response to the rapid spread of a newly identified coronavirus (the “COVID-19”). Within days, alternative ways of delivering court service were put in place in many jurisdictions. The uptake of various technologies, especially video, was accelerated in the justice systems of numerous countries.
There remain some skeptics and critics, but in light of the experience during the crisis, there is certainly greater acceptance now than in February 2020 -- amongst lawyers, judges, officials, and court users—that judicial and court work might be undertaken very differently in years to come. Minds have been opened and changed over the past few months. Many assumptions have been swept aside.
We remain in an era of threat, with risks of barely functioning court systems, greatly reduced access to justice, and, in turn, a potential weakening of the rule of law. We are also in an era of opportunity—the chance to build boldly on the shift of attitude and on demonstrable recent successes with technology, and to put in place improved, sustainable court services that are much more accessible than today’s.
- The Future of Lawyers: Legal Tech, AI, Big Data And Online Courts
Advances in technology such as artificial intelligence (AI) allow modern software to scan legal documents, streamline communications and find relevant casework for lawyers. McKinsey estimates that 23% of work done by lawyers can be automated by existing technology.
In the future, is it conceivable that a firm would be charged with legal malpractice if they didn't use AI? It certainly is. Today, AI offers a solution to solve or at least make the access-to-justice issue better and completely transform our traditional legal system.
AI demonstrates the machines that are intelligent and capable enough to perform tasks and function on their own. The machines that assimilate AI are designed in a way that they can think and behave like a human. This capability has given a rise to businesses in choosing to integrate with AI, in order to enhance their overall efficiency and productivity.
There's no crystal ball for the legal industry, just as there's none for life. That said, industry trends don't arise out of the ether - they develop over time. These trends collectively form the basis for estimations about what the future of the legal industry will look like.
The future of laws and lawyers gives insight into the challenges faced in bringing the traditionally conservative legal system into the 21st century.
