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Checklist of What Law Firms Should Demand in a Complete Legal AI Solution

November 18, 2024 (4 min read)

By Madison Johnson, Esq. | Manager, Large Markets

Consumers were introduced to the generative artificial intelligence (Gen AI) revolution two years ago with the launch of ChatGPT, then the category of Legal AI — Gen AI solutions trained specifically for the legal profession — was born with the rollout of Lexis+ AI in October 2023.

Just one year later, more than half of Am Law 200 law firms (53%) have already purchased Legal AI tools, according to a LexisNexis survey, and this rapid adoption shows no signs of slowing down. Our survey found that two-thirds of in-house counsel have given their law firms the green light to use Gen AI in their legal matters.

Law firm leaders need to be pro-active with embracing this new technology but also sober-minded about how it is used inside their firms and the specific legal research solutions they adopt.

“Creating contracts, briefs, opinions, filings, even arguments in court are all activities that could be dramatically transformed by Gen AI,” reports Forbes. “It’s also possible that the technology could misinform attorneys with its hallucinations in a dramatic way, as it has already done in a few cases. So getting it right is really critical for law firms, general counsels, legal software providers, and other players in the industry.”

Perhaps the most important thing that law firm leaders can do to make sure they are “getting it right” is to place their confidence in a technology platform that is the most complete Legal AI solution available. Here is a checklist of things that law firms should demand when evaluating offerings on the market:

  1. Answer Quality

The accuracy and reliability of the answers provided by a Legal AI solution is crucial. The AI models should be trained on high-quality legal data and be able to accurately understand the context of legal queries in order to provide relevant answers. These answers should be derived from the most comprehensive, grounded legal content and any citations should be validated with a trusted legal citation service.

  1. Data Privacy & Security

Law firms handle highly confidential client information, including sensitive personal data, financial records and proprietary business strategies. Ensuring robust data privacy and security measures are built into your Legal AI platform is essential to maintain client trust and confidence, not to mention the wide range of compliance obligations and ethical guidelines that must be followed. Look for an AI solution that is governed by ethical development principles, is SOC2 certified and uses AES 256-bit encryption.

  1. Technical Architecture

A robust technical architecture ensures that a Legal AI solution is reliable, scalable, secure and easily integrated into other ecosystems. The best Gen AI platforms use a “multi-model, multi-vendor” strategy that relies on a data-driven process to deploy the most suitable model for each task required by the user. For example, GPT-4 is ideal for some legal research tasks, but others may benefit from deployment of Claude 3 models by Anthropic and others may be best-served by use of a fine-tuned Mistral 7B model. Identifying and deploying the best model for the specific user query yields the highest-quality answer with the most up-to-date validated citation references.

  1. Speed

A fast Legal AI solution can give law firms a competitive edge by enabling them to respond to client needs more quickly and pro-actively. Look for a product that leverages cutting-edge natural language processing and machine learning algorithms to deliver lightning-fast responses. Advanced language models should be optimized for speed to process queries and generate relevant, grounded answers in milliseconds.

  1. Powerful Functionality

Law firm leaders should also demand a robust Legal AI solution with powerful features and functionality that can unlock the full potential of Gen AI technology to drive success. For example, your platform should pull from all relevant legal data sources and data to deliver a seamless experience without switching across products that throw up subscription-based restrictions. And look for a solution that is integrated with other workflow applications where your lawyers spend a lot of time, such as Microsoft 365.

  1. Personalized AI Assistant

Gen AI products are extraordinary tools for surfacing information and drafting summaries, but they can be even more powerful when they are tied to a personalized AI assistant that is customized to fit the specific needs and workflows of a firm. The best Legal AI solutions will offer a tailored, powerful legal research and drafting experience delivered by a Legal AI Assistant that is integrated with your firm’s DMS content. This connectivity creates a user experience that is personalized, connected, powerful and secure.

Experience Lexis+ AI

Lexis+ AI performs at greater speed, with greater accuracy (responded correctly 2X more than Westlaw in Stanford study), and at higher capacity than other Legal AI products on the market. Moreover, Lexis+ AI is the only Legal AI solution that is governed by a set of ethical AI development principles, the only platform that provides citation validation with the Shepard’s Citation Service, the only offering that is integrated directly from within Microsoft 365, and the only product that offers a private Legal AI Assistant (LexisNexis Protégé) that securely integrates with a law firm’s DMS.

One Lexis+ AI subscription provides a powerful suite of AI tools that enable conversational search, insightful summarization, intelligent legal drafting, and document upload and analysis capabilities — all in a seamless user experience. Schedule a free trial of Lexis+ AI today.