AI × Law

Vikk AI says it raised $4.2 million in a pre-seed and seed financing to grow its consumer legal assistant, document analysis and generation tools, a lawyer directory, and its sponsored lawyer-ad platform. The company also says it was selected for the AWS/Meta Build with Llama program and received $200,000 in AWS credits, signaling continued investor interest in legal AI startups.

An article published July 30, 2026 benchmarked six AI patent infringement detection tools — Patlytics, PioneerIP, PatentWatch, Techson, ClaimHit and IP Copilot — across 51 patents. The author found lots of noise and limited overlap between vendors, but said the tools still helped surface company-product combinations worth deeper attorney review and claim-charting.

A consolidated class action in the Northern District of California alleges Otter’s AI meeting assistant recorded calls, generated transcripts and voiceprints, and used the data to train its models without proper consent. The case is at the motion-to-dismiss stage, with oral argument set for August 2026, and it could shape how courts treat consumer AI tools that collect user data behind the scenes.

Robbins Geller Rudman & Dowd filed a class action against Microsoft on behalf of investors alleging losses tied to the company’s AI-related product failures. The suit says Microsoft made materially misleading statements about the performance and commercial viability of its AI products, making it a notable AI-related securities case.

The article surveys the fast-moving wave of U.S. copyright lawsuits over AI training, noting more than 40—and possibly over 100—cases against developers like OpenAI, Meta, Anthropic, Stability AI, Midjourney, and Google. It highlights 2025 district court rulings that split on fair use, including a loss for ROSS Intelligence and mixed wins for Anthropic and Meta, showing there is still no nationwide rule on whether training on copyrighted works is lawful.

A federal judge in Minnesota narrowed and expanded discovery in a suit challenging UnitedHealth’s use of an AI tool, nH Predict, for Medicare Advantage coverage decisions. The court allowed plaintiffs to seek materials on policies, governance, oversight, training, and vendor relationships, while blocking requests for source code, underlying data, and embedded medical guidelines.

A new study based on interviews with International Criminal Court judges examines how they view user-generated evidence and the court’s readiness to judge in an age of artificial intelligence. The judges flagged concerns about bias, practical challenges, and the need to prepare legal professionals to handle misinformation, disinformation, and reliability issues tied to digital evidence.

The Financial Times reports that company legal teams are moving beyond off-the-shelf tools and building bespoke AI workflows for tasks like contract review, regulatory flagging, investigations, and third-party screening. The piece cites cases at Upsider, Cox Media Group, Nanyang Technological University, and Endava, and notes that more than two-thirds of in-house teams now expect to rely less on outside counsel as their AI capabilities grow.

Litigation startup Advocacy AI has launched a design partnership with Scott+Scott, a New York complex-litigation firm with about 150 lawyers. The firms plan to customize Advocacy’s platform for the firm, including a potential case-identification use case, which signals how litigators are testing AI beyond general-purpose tools.

LEGALFLY’s job posting says the legal AI platform closed a €15 million Series A and is using the funding to expand across Europe and other jurisdictions, including the U.S. and U.K. It also says the company has customers in Southern Europe, counts Microsoft as a strategic partner, and is trusted by European enterprises and law firms.

Clifford Chance is hiring a Legal Technology Advisor in Hong Kong to help lawyers use GenAI and other legal tech across live matters. The role explicitly covers tools like Copilot, ChatGPT, Legora, Kira and Litera Transact, plus workflows such as contract analysis, document automation, transaction management and eDiscovery. It signals continued Big Law investment in practical AI adoption rather than experimentation alone.

The Supreme Court of India set aside tribunal orders after finding they relied on AI-hallucinated and non-existent case law. It said fake precedents undermine the rule of law, warned that AI must remain only an aid to human reasoning, and directed the Bar Council of India to frame guidelines and disciplinary recommendations.

A federal appeals court revived a proposed antitrust class action alleging that major Atlantic City casino operators used AI software to help fuel higher prices. The ruling is notable because it puts an AI-related pricing theory back into active litigation and could matter for future class actions and antitrust claims involving algorithmic tools.

Chief Justice Susan Christensen signed an order adopting new Chapter 27 of the Iowa Court Rules, titled Judicial Use of Artificial Intelligence Tools. It’s a concrete court-level move setting out AI rules for judges, which litigators will want to track for how courts govern AI use.

Allen & Overy said it has been testing Harvey, a chatbot built on OpenAI’s technology and tuned for legal work, since last November. The firm said about 3,500 lawyers used it for 40,000 queries, a sign major firms are actively deploying generative AI for tasks like document checking, due diligence, and contract analysis.

Harvey published a piece on the eight challenges it says in-house legal teams will face in 2026, including technology selection, AI governance, regulatory change, and rising outside-counsel spend. The article cites ACC, Consilio, and Diligent data and underscores how AI adoption is outpacing governance in corporate legal departments.

Ropes & Gray is giving first-year associates billable credit to learn generative AI, including monthly presentations and a firmwide competition that produced an AI workflow for real estate closing documents. Sheppard has hired AI trainer Conor Grennan for a broader rollout, while Winston is emphasizing “durable” human skills alongside AI use. The piece shows how Big Law is actively reshaping training and workflow around AI.

Harvey is providing its legal AI platform to Microsoft’s Corporate, External, and Legal Affairs team. The piece frames this as a deeper engagement with a major in-house legal department, a useful signal for enterprise adoption in legal AI.

NACDL released a white paper, "Parity in Practice: The Defender’s Duty to Ethically Use AI," aimed at helping criminal defense lawyers use generative AI responsibly. It also launched an Artificial Intelligence Task Force to develop policy and monitor how AI affects defense lawyers and clients.

Latham & Watkins says it has launched an AI Academy to train lawyers on the rapidly evolving AI landscape. The firm also spotlights recent AI-related deal work, including advising Apollo in a $35 billion capital solution for Broadcom’s AI XPV platform and advising on CoreWeave’s $3.1 billion delayed-draw term loan facility.