Robot Lawyer sued for practising without license in US

The world’s first robot lawyer, developed by a startup, DoNotPay, has been sued over allegations of fraud by appearing in the courtroom without a law license to practise in the United States.
According to Washington Examiner, DoNotPay’s Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Joshua Browder and his company have defended Artificial Intelligence to take up the law profession.

However, minutes submitted to the court on March 3 and released on Monday, said the first robot lawyer’s appearance might also be his last.
Artificial intelligence, which has been publicised as the “world’s first robot lawyer” and offers consultancy services on more than 150 subjects, has been on the agenda of both the US and the world in recent months.
The robot lawyer is facing a proposed class section lawsuit filed by Chicago-based law firm, Edelson and published on the website of the Superior Court of the State of California for the County of San Francisco.

“Unfortunately for its customers, DoNotPay is not actually a robot, a lawyer, or a law firm. DoNotPay does not have a law degree, is not barred in any jurisdiction, and is not supervised by any lawyer,” the complaint argued.

The lawsuit was filed on behalf of Jonathan Faridian, who said he hired the services of DoNotPay to draft various legal documents including demand letters, a small claims court filing, and a job discrimination complaint.

The Washington Examiner reported that the AI launched by DoNotPay, could not be used due to the warnings of the court as it was preparing to appear in its first court on February 22.

Browder said the AI is “the world’s first robot lawyer” and “an alternative and inexpensive solution to lawyers.” But, the lawyers have accused the DoNotPay initiative of being “a technology company that manipulates users and acts like a lawyer.”
The documents submitted to the court also included comments made by several citizens who wanted to have their parking tickets removed using DoNotPay’s advisory system.

They complained about paying more than double the amount they should have paid to the court because of the advice of artificial intelligence.

Reacting that DoNotPay received more than 90% bad reviews on the internet and social media as “a failed attempt and a large-scale fraud”, the lawyers judged the CEO of the company with the crimes of “fraud by persuasion” and “informatics fraud.”

In addition, the documents submitted to the court alleged that there would be no problem if the artificial intelligence were described as a “legal adviser” instead of a lawyer, but that the company deliberately lied to market this software in a manipulative way.