AI Resources

AI Practice Directions

New Ontario Practice Directions on the Responsible Use of Artificial Intelligence in Court Proceedings – November 13, 2025

New Artificial Intelligence (AI) practice directions have been posted for both Ontario’s civil and family law proceedings. The practice directions provide guidance on the responsible use of AI in court proceedings and aim to promote transparency, accuracy, and accountability in the use of AI tools.

The Ontario civil proceedings AI practice directions can be found here.

The Ontario family proceedings AI practice directions can be found here.

Manitoba & Yukon have recently published AI Practice Directions and other jurisdictions, such as the SCC, are contemplating it as well.

Canadian Judicial Council – Guidelines for the Use of Artificial Intelligence in Canadian Courts (2024).

Artificial Intelligence Regulation in Canada

The purpose of this AI Canadian Regulation Guide developed by Annette Demers, U of Windsor Law Library,  is to keep an up dated list of bills, laws, regulations, policies and guidelines pertaining to the use of artificial intelligence.

Library staff are often the first point of reliable content for lawyers looking to understand what is reputable in terms of AI.

Lawyers are always looking for efficient ways to win their cases and resources like the popularity of Chat GPT are actively being utilized in their legal research process.   These AI resources can also produce ghost cases or hallucinations which have challenged courthouse library staff to assist lawyers efficiently since the information generated was incorrect as experienced by Derek Drake (Lincoln) as well as others in the network on a regular basis.   Library staff across the LiRN network want to learn more about reputable sources and uses of AI to guide the lawyers towards using these resources.

LiRN’s Managing Director wrote an article about AI’s impact in the June 2025 LiRN newsletter, as well as other Newsletters.

CALL’s Assessment Guide for AI in Legal Research & Writing Applications

CALL AI Assessment Guide

Presenter: Annette Demers (Law Reference Librarian, University of Windsor; LiRN Board Member) at Learn with LiRN 2025

 

Using Generative Artificial Intelligence (GenAI) Tools to Obtain Legal Information – Law Society of Saskatchewan

Public use of GenAI tools is commonplace, and GenAI outputs are increasingly integrated into digital technologies, including GenAI summaries at the top of every internet search. It is important for the public to understand how to use them when looking for legal information. The Saskatchewan Access to Legal Information Initiative (SALI) has created this guide to help support the informed use of GenAI tools.

GenAI creates new content (text, images, audio, and video) by analyzing large datasets and predicting patterns. It does not think independently but generates outputs based on learned structures and predictions. While GenAI tools have the potential to increase the accessibility of information and assist the public with navigating legal information, concerns about accuracy, currency, hallucinations (made-up information), and privacy exist.

Legal Information providers, such as libraries, service agencies, and community organizations, can help the public by:

  • Explaining how GenAI tools work
  • Outlining the risks of using GenAI-generated legal information
  • Identifying signs of credible legal information
  • Guiding the public to reliable legal sources

AI Hallucination cases

Library staff are reporting that lawyers are bringing in hallucinations from using ChatGPT in their legal research despite the warnings.  Below is a link to illustrate this in Canadian courts:

https://www.damiencharlotin.com/hallucinations/

  • 26 in Canada so far – Reported by Matthew Oleynik of rangefinder.ca (Sept. 2026).

Lexis AI review from the CBA site:  https://nationalmagazine.ca/en-ca/articles/law/opinion/2024/law-professor-gives-lexis-ai-a-failing-grade .  It may be some time before we can cease experiencing hallucinations, even on the accredited sites.

e-LiRN AI resources

Lexis+ Canada –  Supercharge your Legal Research with

  • Transform your practice with cutting-edge AI legal tools, now available to all Ontario lawyers through your nearby courthouse library!
  • The future of legal research has arrived at your local courthouse library! Lexis+ Canada is now available at all 48 courthouse libraries across the province, allowing you to leverage the power of extractive artificial intelligence (AI) to help you:
    • Analyze documents to identify key legal issues, compare multiple documents, and explore cited matters;
    • Monitor legislative changes before they come into force, with Legislative Pulse tracking.

Vincent – Reputable AI in your courthouse library

Vlex’s Vincent AI is part the e-LiRN suite of electronic resources and a great source of reputable AI, for example.  Vincent can automatically generate draft arguments in support or opposition, using generative AI technology and drawing from cases within vLex’s vast database to ensure no case-name hallucination, with embedded links for source materials.
Vincent AI Flyer for LiRN network.

Educating Lawyers about Reputable AI

LiRN invited Hor Druma, Head of Canadian Content at Alexi, who spoke about these challenges at Learn with LiRN 2023.  In addition to his work at Alexi, which generates high quality answers in memo format for several Canadian law firms, Hor is an active vlogger about AI on LinkedIn.

Library staff learned about the positive and negative impacts of AI on legal research and how they can help educate their lawyers to better understand the importance of selecting a reputable choice from his engaging talk.  They also learned how it can save them time and effort in their work as well!

Article by Stanford University (May 2024)  AI on Trial: Legal Models Hallucinate in 1 out of 6 (or More) Benchmarking Queries | Stanford HAI

AI – How law firms are using AI and how to help lawyers who want to use it

Presenter: Katie Sharp (Product Manager, Alexi)  Learn with LiRN 2025

NSRLP Webinar: Artificial Intelligence and Access to Justice: Pros and Cons for Self-Represented Litigants

National Self-Represented Litigants Project (NSRLP) Executive Director Jennifer Leitch welcomes Professor Maura Grossman, Professor Amy Salyzyn, and Justice Peter Lauwers for a discussion on the rising use of artificial intelligence (AI) by self-represented litigants (SRLs) in the Canadian justice system, including what SRLs should be aware of and how they might navigate the use of AI.   Topics will include: SRLs’ increasing use of AI tools, which tools they’re using, and for what purposes; what AI is, what it is not, and how it works; the gap between AI tools accessible by lawyers, and those available to the public; the dangers of AI that SRLs must be aware of; what the courts are seeing, and how they’re responding; and recommendations on how to use AI responsibly. The session will end with a public Q&A with all panelists.   Recording of seminar.

LiRN network contributions

Jacquie Fex (LiRN’s Roving Librarian) attended Computers in Libraries 2024 in Washington, DC and many of the sessions there touched upon AI and its impact on libraries.  Please see her notes and links to the actual presentations.

Lynda Cavanagh (Leeds Grenville)  recommends a great book about AI if you wish to learn more:

The Legal Singularity; how Artificial Intelligence can make law Radically Better by Abdi Aidid and Benjamin Alarie,  Toronto:  University of Toronto Press, 2023.

Brenda Lauritzen (Carleton) has found Chat GPT is useful for things like  – marketing, emails, brainstorming, summaries, coding in Excel/VBA for reports, things like that. She highly recommends that people try it out for everyday tasks and get familiar with what it does well!

If you have a contribution about AI, please share it below.