Lauren Quattromani.

All lawyer jokes aside, artificial intelligence (AI) finally is beginning to make inroads in the legal industry. But how deeply will we feel its presence? And which practice areas will it benefit the most?

In the realm of contract drafting, we have already seen the advent of online automated legal services such as Rocket Lawyer, LegalZoom and LawDepot. These services offer the consumer basic legal forms but face legitimate criticism regarding the sufficiency of these agreements in protecting a client against risk, both known and unknown. While online document generators can fill an immediate need in providing a product for a client on a budget, or with a tight deadline to meet, these agreements often are not adequate in terms of anticipating legal pitfalls that might otherwise easily have been recognized by an experienced attorney.

Because of the many shortfalls associated with automated legal documents, sophisticated legal consumers and law firms themselves are beginning to explore the role, if any, that AI can play in drafting contracts and whether this innovation can be relied on to provide adequate protection for clients. Specifically, machine learning and deep learning techniques are being implemented and packaged as software programs for contract drafting.