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Artificial Intelligence and the Law: a discussion paper

Published:
Digital brain hologram.

Law Commission publishes discussion paper on Artificial Intelligence and the Law

The paper aims to raise awareness of legal issues regarding AI, prompting wider discussion of the topic, and to act as a step towards identifying those areas most in need of law reform.  You can find the discussion paper on this link.

The paper explains what AI is and how it works, and considers how it might raise legal issues in private, public and criminal law under the following themes:

  • AI autonomy and adaptiveness. 
  • Interaction with and reliance on AI. 
  • AI training and data. 

The paper does not contain proposals for law reform.

The Law Commission has already completed work relating to or involving AI, including on automated vehicles, and with respect to AI deepfakes in its project on intimate image abuse. We also have an ongoing project relating to AI, on aviation autonomy, as well as a pending project on product liability, which will consider AI. We anticipate that AI will increasingly impact the substance of our law reform work, including, potentially, as the focus of future projects.

AI is developing rapidly and being used in an increasingly wide variety of applications, from automated driving to diagnosing health conditions. This is likely to continue and the degree to which AI will impact the daily life of our society is very considerable. However, with AI’s potential benefits comes potential harm. It is important that the laws of England and Wales evolve so that they are up to the task of the many changes being wrought by AI. The purpose of this paper is to increase awareness of the potential impacts of AI on the law and to encourage discussion of these issues as a step towards future law reform, where it is required.
Sir Peter Fraser, Chair of the Law Commission
AI and the Law: a discussion paper
(PDF, 3 MB)