Joshua Browder, the CEO of the New York-based startup DoNotPay, created a way for people contesting traffic tickets to use arguments in court generated by artificial intelligence.
Here’s how it was supposed to work: The person challenging a speeding ticket would wear smart glasses that both record court proceedings and dictate responses into the defendant’s ear from a small speaker. The system relied on a few leading AI text generators, including ChatGPT and DaVinci.
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“Multiple state bar associations have threatened us,” Browder said. “One even said a referral to the district attorney’s office and prosecution and prison time would be possible.”
“Even if it wouldn’t happen, the threat of criminal charges was enough to give it up,” he said. “The letters have become so frequent that we thought it was just a distraction and that we should move on.”
Although I don’t think it is especially smart to expect a large language model will offer you cogent legal advice I am surprised it is illegal. If I could, for example, research the relevant laws using Google, textbooks, etc and then represent myself in court why couldn’t I use ChatGPT to do the same? I guess the problem probably lies with DoNotPay trying to charge for this service.
With that said, obviously I’m not a lawyer (I’m not even a large language model). So I am quite out of my depth here.
Instead of trying to help those accused of traffic violations use AI in the courtroom, Browder said DoNotPay will train its focus on assisting people dealing with expensive medical bills, unwanted subscriptions and issues with credit reporting agencies.
I saw Browder’s demonstration of using ChatGPT to negotiate Comcast bills a little while ago. It is pretty impressive and, more importantly, the stakes are much lower than when writing legal arguments. Besides, although ChatGPT can pass some law school exams, it is not quite ready to take the bar.