Judges’ Public AI Bans During Discovery Zero in on Privacy Risk
Judges’ Public AI Bans During Discovery Zero in on Privacy Risk
Publish Date: 2026-06-05 04:30:00
Source Domain: news.bloomberglaw.com
Judges are increasingly using discovery orders to manage the risks of generative artificial intelligence in litigation. Two recent federal court decisions—Jeffries v. Harcros Chemicals, Inc. and Morgan v. V2X, Inc.— illustrate how judges are addressing generative AI.
Rather than resolving the more difficult and open questions that surround privilege and waiver, they focused on the practical implications of AI as a discovery-management and data-handling tool. These courts used protective orders to impose guardrails on how litigants may or may not use AI tools when handling material produced in discovery.
These decisions don’t prohibit AI use in litigation. But both courts concluded that confidentiality and data privacy risks associated with widely available, public AI tools justify targeted protective measures.
Jeffries recognizes that, when the facts so warrant, those risks will justify prohibiting litigants from uploading any produced documents into public AI tools. Morgan provides formal guidance on the minimum contractual terms necessary to protect confidential information and determined that the identity of a party’s AI tool is discoverable.
Together, these decisions signal that courts are willing to impose AI-specific restrictions through protective orders, and that counsel should expect judicial scrutiny of AI use in discovery.
Restrictions to foster AI as a discovery tool: The Jeffries court expanded the existing protective order to prohibit the parties from uploading any produced documents into public AI tools.
While its decision was fact-driven, Jeffries identified several functional risks the court viewed as warranting general application: potential difficulty of clawback once data has been incorporated into model training, uncertainty regarding storage and downstream use absent contractual protections, and the risk of public exposure of sensitive or regulated data. Because the court found those risks particularly acute on the facts, it imposed a…
