Technology

A test in the family courts will be the next step in exploring fully video hearings, against a backdrop of widespread concern about the technology among judges, it has emerged.

A project that will look at the ethical and others issues that technology raises for legal services and their regulation has been launched by the Legal Services Board.

Lawtech can provide a “virtuous circle” that simultaneously both improves access to justice and delivers social and gender mobility to the upper reaches of the judiciary, according to a senior judge.

If junior associates are “gradually culled” from law firms as a result of automation, the “entire reproduction of the legal profession could be jeopardised”, a leading academic has warned.

MPs are to probe the access to justice implications of the £1bn court modernisation programme. The justice select committee will consider issues such as the increasing use of digital technology.

LexisNexis, working closely with the Civil Justice Council and others, is poised to launch the first of three projects to create digital tools for the advice sector, it has emerged.

An AI-backed product that uses natural language processing to help not-for-profit agencies identify precisely the legal nature of a problem is set to launch next year.

Email will be replaced within five years by a more secure means of communication for law firms, an expert predicted this week. Meanwhile, the SRA is using behavioural science in its messaging.

Contract review business ThoughtRiver has been awarded funding from the government for a £400,000 development project to develop “thinking AI”.

Law firms must be able to explain “automated decisions”, including those involving artificial intelligence (AI), the Solicitors Regulation Authority has warned.