A further use case for Blockchain in Estonia is emerging in the form of Agrello's self-signing legal contracts. Under plans announced by the startup this week, the legal practice in Estonia could soon see Blockchain-based smart contracts and artificial intelligence (AI) leave their mark. "Until now, current Smart Contract technology has been impossible to implement as a real-world agreement due to its lack of legal visibility and obscured nature," Agrello's chief scientist Alexander Norta said in an accompanying press release. "Utilizing state of the art AI technology, we are bridging the gap between the Blockchain, the legal world and the non-coding end user to make Smart Contracts legally-binding and available to everyone." Estonia has been actively perusing the possibilities afforded by Blockchain for several years and has positioned itself as a global leader in e-government.

Although artificial intelligence (AI) has experienced a number of "springs" and "winters" in its roughly 60-year history, it is safe to expect the current AI spring to be both lasting and fertile. Applications that seemed like science fiction a decade ago are becoming science fact at a pace that has surprised even many experts. The stage for the current AI revival was set in 2011 with the televised triumph of the IBM Watson computer system over former Jeopardy! This watershed moment has been followed rapid-fire by a sequence of striking breakthroughs, many involving the machine learning technique known as deep learning. Computer algorithms now beat humans at games of skill, master video games with no prior instruction, 3D-print original paintings in the style of Rembrandt, grade student papers, cook meals, vacuum floors, and drive cars.1 All of this has created considerable uncertainty about our future relationship with machines, the prospect of technological unemployment, and even the very fate of humanity. Regarding the latter topic, Elon Musk has described AI "our biggest existential threat." Stephen Hawking warned that "The development of full artificial intelligence could spell the end of the human race." In his widely discussed book Superintelligence, the philosopher Nick Bostrom discusses the possibility of a kind of technological "singularity" at which point the general cognitive abilities of computers exceed those of humans.2 Discussions of these issues are often muddied by the tacit assumption that, because computers outperform humans at various circumscribed tasks, they will soon be able to "outthink" us more generally. Continual rapid growth in computing power and AI breakthroughs notwithstanding, this premise is far from obvious.

Artificial intelligence is a booming business in 2017, but one that also comes with significant baggage in the form of public misunderstanding, potential job losses, and fear. Last fall, A.I. competitors Amazon, Microsoft, Facebook, IBM, and Google banded together to form the Partnership on AI to Benefit People and Society, an industry-led attempt to get ahead of the many social, ethical, and economic issues presented by the advent of technology with increasingly human-like capabilities. Apple joined the group as another founding member earlier this year. On Tuesday, the Partnership on AI (PAI) announced nearly two dozen new members, including more of the tech industry's biggest names--Intel, eBay, Salesforce, and SAP among them--and many of the world's foremost A.I. research institutions, such as the Seattle-based Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence. Also joining are nonprofits focused on digital privacy, human rights, and freedom.

Artificial Intelligence is a hot topic these days, but hype tends to be much easier to find than practical advice on how to use AI in a law department. What kinds of AI can make a difference today? What use cases are best for the benefits AI offers? How can legal service providers leverage AI? These are questions that Paul Lippe, part of Elevate's Advisory Board, answered with Inside Counsel.

Legal AI company Voltaire has launched an application that will allow lawyers and litigation consultants to rapidly analyse potential jurors by crunching public Big Data, including social media posts. The system is of primary use in America and similar legal systems where lawyers for either side in a trial are allowed to research potential jurors before the case commences and selectively apply preemptory strikes, or make a case for a'for-cause' in order to seek a better outcome for their client. Also known as the voir dire phase of trial, jury analysis and selection is an often complex and time-consuming element to much US litigation. Voltaire hopes to use AI, such as machine learning and natural language processing (NLP) to not just greatly speed up the process, but to provide lawyers with new insights via Big Data analysis that would normally be very hard and expensive to attain using manual methods. Colorado-based founder and former IBM staffer, Basit Mustafa, explains to Artificial Lawyer that Voltaire explores all public data related to the potential juror, correlates the data against known patterns in human behaviour and then produces a detailed profile, with indications of the type of person they are and how their views and biases may be a positive or negative factor as part of a jury.

We look forward to collaborating with other industry-leading Partnership on AI members to address the challenges and opportunities within the AI field including companies, nonprofits and institutions and with founding members Apple, Amazon, Facebook, Google / DeepMind, IBM and Microsoft; existing Partners AAAI, ACLU, OpenAI; and new Partners: AI Forum of New Zealand (AIFNZ), Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence (AI2), Centre for Democracy & Tech (CDT), Centre for Internet and Society, India (CIS), Cogitai, Data & Society Research Institute (D&S), Digital Asia Hub, eBay, Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), Future of Humanity Institute (FHI), Future of Privacy Forum (FPF), Human Rights Watch (HRW), Intel, Leverhulme Centre for the Future of Intelligence (CFI), McKinsey & Company, SAP, Salesforce, Sony, UNICEF, Upturn, XPRIZE Foundation and Zalando.

Artificial intelligence companies are sprouting all over the world. With rapid advancements ranging from virtual assistants to fraud detection, AI has come a long way recently. Almost every organization, whether it is fashion, banking or retail, is using AI in a way possible to innovate and make their services better. Technology giants like Apple, Google, Intel, Samsung and Salesforce are competing in the race to acquire private AI companies. More than 200 small companies using AI algorithms across different verticals have been acquired since 2012, with over 30 acquisitions taking place in the first quarter of 2017 alone.

This image released by Twentieth Century Fox shows Michael Fassbender who portrays android David in a scene from "Alien: Covenant." Filmmakers have long projected that artificial intelligence could spell the end of humanity. "Prometheus" director Ridley Scott, who further explores the cunning side of artificial intelligence in his new "Alien: Covenant," says, "If you're going to use something that's smarter than you are, that's when it starts to get dangerous."

Supreme Court judges could soon be out of a job, as it appears that robots are just as good in court. Scientists have designed a machine-learning algorithm that can accurately predict over 70 per cent of Supreme Court decisions. The team believes that the bot could be used to help lawyers frame their arguments to succeed in the courtroom. Supreme Court judges could soon be out of a job, as it appears that robots are just as good in court. The researchers created an algorithm based on a neural network, which tries to simulate the way the brain works in order to learn.

Earlier this month, researchers unveiled an AI computer that could predict the results of Supreme Court trials better than a human. While its designers were hopeful that the device could soon be used in the courtroom, an expert has warned that using AI to sentence criminals is a'dangerous idea.' In an article for The Conversation, Mr Christopher Markou, a PhD candidate in the Faculty of Law at the University of Cambridge explains why he think we should boycott AI judges. Earlier this month, researchers unveiled an AI computer that could predict the results of Supreme Court trials better than a human. While its designers were hopeful that the device could soon be used in the courtroom, an expert has warned that using AI to sentence criminals is a'dangerous idea' Earlier this month, researchers from the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago, and South Texas College of Law created an algorithm based on a neural network, which tries to simulate the way the brain works in order to learn. The algorithm analysed the US Supreme Court Database, which holds data on court cases dating back to 1791.