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AI hallucinations: risks & blunders

10 July 2026 / Author(s): Dr Charanjit Singh
Issue: 8169 / Categories: Career Clinic
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Dr Charanjit Singh advises lawyers to deliberate before they outsource the thinking process
  • Examines the recent cautionary cases of Cork and another v Smith [2026] EWHC 1199 (Ch) and Re A, B, C, D (Extension of assessment; Use of AI: hallucinations) [2026] EWFC 71 (B).
  • Explores how to safeguard and/or mitigate the risks surrounding AI hallucinations.

Artificial intelligence (AI) will continue to transform the legal profession, having moved its focus from workflow digitisation to research and completing practical tasks; from data retrieval to reasoning, execution and drafting (caveat).

In a previous NLJ article (‘Case law hallucinations: Just an illusion?’ NLJ, 30 January 2026, pp17-18), I set out how modern AI systems naturally and independently perform and outthink their human-counterparts, developing ‘intelligence’ (that simulates human intelligence) thereby mastering complex, technical, and time-consuming tasks. Major AI systems developed for law rely on subscriptions for ultimate retrieval augmented generation (RAG); Thomson Reuters CoCounsel, Westlaw Precision and Westlaw Advantage, and Lexis+ with Protégé are a few key examples, and

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