Writing in NLJ this week, Ian McDougall, president of the LexisNexis Rule of Law Foundation, says established principles of negligence, product liability and agency already address most problems attributed to AI.
Opaque systems, complex supply chains and delegated decision-making have familiar legal counterparts. Developers and deployers should not escape responsibility simply because the precise mechanism of harm was unpredictable.
McDougall also rejects granting AI legal personality, warning this could create an assetless defendant to which others conveniently point.
Targeted changes may nevertheless help, including compulsory insurance for high-risk uses and carefully confined strict liability where reasonable testing cannot prevent harm.
The priority in most cases is identifying those responsible and ensuring victims can recover compensation. As McDougall puts it: ‘Panic has never been a legal theory.’
