NLawP: Natural Language Processing and Legal Tech

AI language technologies have a hugely disruptive potential that could provide possibilities for advances in areas that these technologies have not yet permeated. The legal sector is an excellent example in this regard. Recent advances such as new transformers like BERT and GPT3 offer ample prospects for innovation and could help overcoming long known issues such as access to justice. However, neither the requirements for adoption nor the ethical, legal and social implications are sufficiently explored. The project NLawP, a cooperation between the Professorship for Law, Sciences and Technology and the department of Informatics, evaluates how AI technologies can disruptively affect the legal sector. It will produce an overview of current developments and future trends in research and the legal tech market through interchange with key stakeholders in the field.

This project will map state-of-the-art applications and current information about their implications concerning responsible AI. The mapping should result in a better understanding of how specific design choices improve ethical, legal and social aspects. With its multi-perspective approach, the map has the potential to become a central reference point in the debate.

Based on this, the research team will inquire into how data governance can enable a responsible and efficient adoption. The project will allow research into this emerging field of AI with a view to innovation, adoption, responsible uses, and infrastructures. The project will also look into the following steps concerning a sustainable data infrastructure for the legal sector and potential stakeholders’ innovations and imaginaries.

Further informations can be found here.

Project leader(s):
Prof. Dr. Christian Djeffal; Prof. Dr. Florian Matthes