'Robot' Lawyer DoNotPay Sued For Unlicensed Practice Of Law: It's Giving 'Poor Legal Advice'
Joshua Browder is the founder of DoNotPay, a legal artificial intelligence (AI) platform aimed at assisting people with legal advice at lower costs.
On March 16, Browder tweeted, “DoNotPay is working on using GPT-4 to generate ‘one-click lawsuits’ to sue robocallers for $1,500. Imagine receiving a call, clicking a button, call is transcribed and 1,000-word lawsuit is generated. GPT 3.5 was not good enough, but GPT-4 handles the job extremely well.”
There is a ton to unpack here. If you believe Browder, this means GPT-4 unlocks plenty of capabilities for many founders and startups looking to build on top of the platform. It is worth noting that GPT-4 did pass the LSAT, SAT and Uniform Bar Exam. It is also 82% less likely to respond when prompts are technically not allowed and 60% less likely to fabricate facts, according to the Alignment Research Center.
But the existential question at hand is: Should AI bots be allowed to render legal advice in any circumstance? DoNotPay is not barred in any state or jurisdiction and is in the midst of a class-action lawsuit in which many customers argue they received subpar legal advice.
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The Argument For
Legal advice can be extremely expensive. Lawyers are paid handsomely for their tactical knowledge and experience. One major strength of AI is its ability to sift through massive amounts of information to generate a nuanced, relevant and correct response. This seems to be relevant to any sort of legal dilemma. Imagine a lawyer who could reference every court case ever in a matter of seconds and then offer a rebuttal. This, at least in theory, sounds attractive. If this sort of product were to come to fruition it could offer objective, fair and accessible legal guidance to the masses.
The Argument Against
AI is not perfect, and many have been quick to highlight some biases on GPT, the platform DoNotPay is built on. The U.S. legal system is old and relies on tradition. These are nuances an AI bot may not pick up on. A lawyer also can be held accountable for malpractice, but what happens when an AI bot makes a mistake? Would a mistrial be warranted, and would this require a real human lawyer to be assigned? As noted above, mistakes have already been made by Browder’s DoNotPay. Any legal advice from AI today seems to be at the very least a big risk.
U.S. plaintiffs’ law firm Edelson, which specializes in class action and consumer protection laws, brought the class action lawsuit against DoNotPay. The named plaintiff, Jonathan Faridian, claims he tried to use the service for demand letters, an independent contractor agreement, LLC operating agreements and several other court filings. Faridian claims many of the documents arrived late, had misspelled names and in some cases were completely blank.
According to Edelson, this could have jeopardized the claims Faridian was trying to file because of timing and inaccuracy. He would not have paid for these services if he knew they were coming from anything other than a lawyer. This does not bode well for Browder’s company or AI in the courtroom.
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Browder has been aggressive with his plans for DoNotPay. On Jan. 8, he tweeted that his company would “pay any lawyer or person $1 million with an upcoming case in from the United States Supreme Court to wear airpods and let our robot lawyer argue the case by repeating exactly what it says.” Many institutions didn’t take the tween well, and it still carries a warning from Twitter. No one has successfully taken Browder up on this deal.
The first AI hearing was set to take place in California on Feb. 22 but was met with severe backlash and never happened. Browder has publicly stated that “multiple state bars have threatened us” and even said that one threatened prison time. Browder is seemingly unphased by the backlash.
The Takeaway
AI could add value to the legal system. What that looks like today is still up for debate. So far, mistakes have been made, but AI will continue to get better. If AI does find a place in the legal industry, it would mean much cheaper legal advice and a much lower demand for lawyers in many fields. The fight will likely continue to grow, and it doesn’t seem there will be any clear winner any time soon.
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