INTRODUCTION
Legal research is the systematic process of identifying, locating, and analysing legal information such as statutes, case laws, and scholarly writings to resolve a legal issue or develop legal arguments.1 The role of legal research in the society is massive. Court relies on legal research to interpret law, lawyers use the legal research to build arguments and academics use it to critically evaluate the legal systems. Policymakers use the legal research to understand the gaps in law and how to rectify them. Legal research plays a crucial role in the building of the society, understanding the problems of the society and solving those problems with the intervention of law. For any legal research to be meaningful, data collection becomes very important. Data collection refers to the process of gathering relevant information, which is required to answer a research question. Data collection in legal research often implies judgements, statutes, legislative debates, interviews, and observations. Data collection is key in legal research. If data collection is incomplete, then the conclusion is bound to be weak and if data is biased, then conclusion reached will be distorted. The traditional method of data collection was primarily human driven method, the researcher used to read texts, interpret meaning and apply reasoning The method of data collection was largely based on human intelligence and understanding. The doctrinal method was used to read the law, statutes, case laws, and non-doctrinal method was used to understand how law works in real life. Primary as well as secondary data was used to reach to the conclusion. The traditional method of data collection have certain limitations as it is time consuming. It is also expensive and there is a limited scope. It can be said that traditional method of data collection prioritised accuracy over efficiency. With the advent of artificial intelligence, the method of data collection is changing significantly because of artificial intelligence, there is a faster access.2The database is wider and less manual effort is required, but at the same time, the human control is also less. Artificial intelligence performs the role of human intelligence by understanding the language pattern and recognition. Artificial intelligence plays role in legal research by reading cases, identifying relevant judgements, and suggesting legal arguments. Artificial intelligence definitely saves the time, but at the same time there are certain dangers associated with it primarily being artificial intelligence can misinterpret the law. It can carry bias from past data, and it is not transparent.
THE ROLE OF ETHICS IN LEGAL RESEARCH
Legal research is the systematic process of identifying, locating, and analysing legal information such as statutes, case laws, and scholarly writings to resolve a legal issue or develop legal arguments.3Ethics is the foremost requirement in any field of research, but more so in the field of legal research. The advancement of law is required for ensuring justice in the society and if legal research is devoid of ethics, then it has a negative impact on the entire society. Ethics can be simply defined as moral principles, guiding researcher while doing his research.4 It incorporates honesty, integrity, objectivity, and accountability. Ethics informs a researcher what is right and wrong while conducting research. Ethics being followed in research ensures integrity of research and makes the conclusion truthful and reliable. If facts are manipulated, then wrong legal conclusions are the result. Ethics in research maintains credibility, trust and protects justice system. It also prevents misuse of law and supports academic honesty in totality.There are certain ethical principles which must be followed in a
legal research like honesty, which requires a researcher to present facts in a truthful manner and no false data should be incorporated in the research. Objectivity ensures that there is no bias in the findings and the researcher is not manipulating the data to support preconceived notions. Integrity requires consistency between research methods findings, and conclusion arrived by the researcher. Transparency requires that sources used and methodology of the research should be properly explained so that research can be understood and can lead to further development of the knowledge. Confidentiality is very important in protecting the sensitive data of the clients of the people who have been interviewed, and from whom data has been collected by promising confidentiality. Accountability requires the researcher to owe responsibility for any error or misinterpretation done in the research. In today’s day and age, the method of doing legal research has undergone a substantial change. Digital sources are widely available and artificial intelligence has also entered into the picture AI tools can generate content and can summarise also however, it raises the ethical concern of over reliance, lack of originality and wrong interpretation, which has the potential to become fatal in any legal research.4 The digital sources are widely available, but it becomes ethical responsibility of a researcher to verify authenticity of such websites, articles, and contents. Another important thing which must be kept in mind by the researcher is of data privacy, more so in a Socio- legal research, and where personal data is involved. Ethical legal research ensures that law serves its true purpose—justice, fairness, and social order.
THE TRANSFORMATION OF DATA COLLECTION THROUGH ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
Artificial intelligence is changing the landscape of data collection in legal research. The way artificial intelligence is playing a role in collecting data in legal research is massive. 5Artificial intelligence replaces manual reading with automated scanning and human sorting is replaced by algorithmic filtering. Multiple tools, which are AI-based are used to search case laws, suggest relevant judgements and artificial intelligence has been incorporated in all the legal databases, which helps in suggesting relevant case laws and analysing it to provide relevant information. It is important to understand that how artificial intelligence collects data. Artificial intelligence does data mining whereby artificial intelligence scans thousands of judgements where artificial intelligence can understand the facts of the cases, the legal issues involved in those cases and outcomes of those cases. Artificial intelligence also works on natural language processing, artificial intelligence understands human language and it reads legal texts and interpret questions to provide relevant answers. Artificial intelligence also does predictive analysis, whereby on the basis of extensive data, it can predict the outcome of a case and likelihood of a judgement going in a particular direction. 6The use of artificial intelligence in data collection is extensive. The process is speedy and what used to take days can be finished within few hours. The scale of research has become humungous as thousands and thousands of case laws can be analysed in a short time. Along with speed and scale the accessibility has also transformed. A person with a minimal knowledge in law can also explore the extensive legal databases and can reach to a fair understanding of law. If the traditional method of data collection is compared with the artificial intelligence collecting the data, then few contrasts are very clear in the out. The traditional method was deeper, whereas artificial intelligence is more wider. In traditional method, the reasoning was very clear and transparent whereas in artificial intelligence, the decision is opaque and hidden and the reasoning of the decision is not clearly explainable. The traditional method was accurate, whereas data collection by artificial intelligence is faster.
ETHICAL DIMENSIONS AND CHALLENGES IN AI-DRIVEN LEGAL RESEARCH
Ethics is the cornerstone of legal research. Legal research which is not ethical is meaningless. Ethics in legal research denotes fairness, honesty, and responsibility. In every legal research, it is the duty of the legal researcher to ensure that the element of ethics while conducting research has been fulfilled in entirety. Legal research, which is not ethical can become counterproductive and can lead to distorted conclusions, which can ultimately be harmful for the society. For this very reason in any legal research, it is expected that ethics will be followed and the conclusion will not be dishonest. There are certain serious challenges involved in artificial intelligence collecting the data. The first challenge is of bias, which is a prejudice in data. 7Artificial intelligence collects and analyses the past judgements and if the past judgements were biased, then artificial intelligence repeat it at scale and perpetuate it to a
larger extent, the data fed into artificial intelligence is not always neutral and it often caters to the needs of corporations and the developed countries, which have invested in developing it. If neutrality is not ensured in collecting data, then the probability of bias increases which is fatal in legal research. Another serious problem is of accuracy. It has been well understood in the field of artificial intelligence that it can misinterpret the data and can hallucinate.8 If the misinterpretation of data happens and hallucination happens then a question mark comes on the credibility of the legal research. Another challenge associated with artificial intelligence collecting data is of transparency. The decision taken by artificial intelligence are not explained properly and it has direct impact on the principles of natural justice as artificial intelligence does not clearly explain that on what basis these decisions have been taken by it and nondisclosure of the basis of information is against the principle of natural justice. Another problem associated with artificial intelligence collecting data is of privacy and there is a substantial risk of data leak and surveillance of data at mass level. Another question which comes is of accountability. What happens if artificial intelligence gives wrong analysis and is mistaken then who will be responsible for the mistake of artificial intelligence. Will it be developer or the user or the agency which has deployed it are serious questions being pondered over by the courts throughout the globe. The biggest challenge of using artificial intelligence in data collection is of academic integrity as copying the output from artificial intelligence and not having original thinking challenges the traditional notion of academic integrity, which requires original thinking and sufficient reasoning to reach to any meaningful conclusion.
REGULATORY FRAMEWORKS AND THE FUTURE OF HUMAN-AI COLLABORATION
Artificial intelligence is powerful and has huge potential in the field of data collection but there is no sufficient and clear legal control to regulate it and hence it becomes important to have sufficient regulation in place. The three most important questions which needs to be regulated are of transparency, accountability, and fairness. The data collection done by artificial intelligence must withstand the test of being transparent, accountable, and fair as these are the corner stones of any legal research. It is required that human must be in the loop whereby artificial intelligence assists and human being decides. If artificial intelligence is regulated sufficiently, then the method of data collection becomes much easier and more efficient, which can increase the quality of the legal research and can go a long way in helping the law, policymakers, and the society.
CONCLUSION
Artificial intelligence is changing the landscape of data collection in legal research, but for any legal research to be meaningful, data collection must be ethical and the element of ethics must be fulfilled in entirety. While the process is speedy and what used to take days can be finished within few hours, the biggest challenge of using artificial intelligence in data collection is of academic integrity, as copying the output from AI challenges the traditional notion of original thinking. Artificial intelligence replaces manual reading with automated scanning and human sorting is replaced by algorithmic filtering, yet the traditional method of data collection was deeper, whereas artificial intelligence is wider. The use of artificial intelligence in data collection is extensive, as it performs data mining where it scans thousands of judgements to understand facts, legal issues, and outcomes. However, if data is biased, then the conclusion reached will be distorted, and artificial intelligence can carry bias from past data. Artificial intelligence also works on natural language processing to interpret questions and provide relevant answers, but it has been well understood that it can misinterpret the data and hallucinate. While AI definitely saves the time and accessibility has transformed, legal research which is not ethical can become counterproductive and lead to distorted conclusions which can ultimately be harmful for the society. In the traditional method, the reasoning was very clear and transparent, whereas in artificial intelligence, the decision is opaque and hidden, and the reasoning is not clearly explainable. This non-disclosure of the basis of information is against the principle of natural justice. Although artificial intelligence has been incorporated in all the legal databases to help suggest relevant case laws, there is a substantial risk of data leak and surveillance of data at a mass level. The database is wider and less manual effort is required, but at the same time, the human control is also less. There is no sufficient and clear legal control to regulate artificial intelligence, and it is required that a human must be in the loop whereby AI assists and a human being decide. While artificial intelligence is powerful and has huge potential in the field of data collection, if the misinterpretation of data happens, then a question mark comes on the credibility of the legal research. Serious questions are being pondered over by the courts throughout the globe regarding who will be responsible for the mistake of artificial intelligence, the developer, the user, or the agency. If artificial intelligence is regulated sufficiently so that it is transparent, accountable, and fair, then the method of data collection becomes much easier and more efficient, which can increase the quality of the legal research.
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Footnotes
1. P Ishwara Bhat, Idea and methods of legal research (Oxford University Press, 2019).
2. Yanqing Duan, John S Edwards, Yogesh K Dwivedi, ‘’Artificial intelligence for decision making in the era of Big Data–evolution, challenges and research agenda’’, 48 International journal of information management 6371 (2019).
3. SN Jain, “Legal Research and Methodology”, 14(4) Journal of the Indian Law Institute 487-500 (1972). 4 Annette N Markham, “Ethic as method”, 15(2) Journal of Information 37-55 (2006).
4. Khadijeh Harati, ChatGPT and AI-powered writing tools: “Unveiling risks and ethical challenges in scientific writing”, 4(1) Journal of Reviews in Medical Sciences 1-6 (2024).
5. Benjamin Alarie, Anthony Niblett, Albert H Yoon, “How artificial intelligence will affect the practice of law”, 68 Supplement 1 University of Toronto Law Journal 106-124 (2018).
6. Ibid
7. Alfonso Min, ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE AND BIAS: “CHALLENGES, IMPLICATIONS, AND REMEDIES”, 2 Journal of Social Research 11 (2023).
8. Amr Adel, Noor Alani, “Can generative AI reliably synthesise literature? exploring hallucination issues in ChatGPT”,AI and Society 1-14 (2025).