Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

DoNotPay has to pay $193K for falsely touting untested AI lawyer, FTC says

arstechnica.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 218 posts

Re: DoNotPay has to pay $193K for falsely touting untested AI lawyer, FTC says

#11

Post by ziddoap »

sixhobbits wrote: post #6
ziddoap wrote: post #4

> DoNotPay also did not "hire or retain any attorneys" to help verify AI outputs or validate DoNotPay's legal claims. Wow, that's brave. Create a wrapper around ChatGPT, call it a lawyer, and never check the output. $193k fine seems like peanuts. Sometimes I think about where I would be in life if I had no moral or ethical qualms. I'd probably be running a company like this.

DoNotPay predates GPT by quite a bit -- it used to be pretty positively received on HN e.g. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13822289

Not sure about the history, I based my comment on this quote from the article:

>[...] DoNotPay's legal service [...] relying on an API with OpenAI's ChatGPT.

Perhaps they rolled their own chatbot then later switched to ChatGPT? Either way, they probably should have a lawyer involved at some point in the process.

Re: DoNotPay has to pay $193K for falsely touting untested AI lawyer, FTC says

#12

Post by ahmeneeroe-v2 »

sixhobbits wrote: post #6
ziddoap wrote: post #4

> DoNotPay also did not "hire or retain any attorneys" to help verify AI outputs or validate DoNotPay's legal claims. Wow, that's brave. Create a wrapper around ChatGPT, call it a lawyer, and never check the output. $193k fine seems like peanuts. Sometimes I think about where I would be in life if I had no moral or ethical qualms. I'd probably be running a company like this.

DoNotPay predates GPT by quite a bit -- it used to be pretty positively received on HN e.g. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13822289

Yes! I used this "AI" tool to help a friend write a letter to her landlord. It was not at all "generative AI" and seemed to just paste modules together based on her answers to its questionnaire.

To your second point, it's very funny how OpenAI seems to have soured the tech crowd on tech.

Re: DoNotPay has to pay $193K for falsely touting untested AI lawyer, FTC says

#13

Post by [deleted] »

gradyfps wrote: post #10
Mordisquitos wrote: post #8

I love the quote they included in their ads, purportedly from the Los Angeles Time but "actually from a high-schooler’s opinion piece in the Los Angeles Times’ High School Insider": > "what this robot lawyer can do is astonishingly similar—if not more—to what human lawyers do."

To be fair if legal paperwork follows a standard process with standard information, a "robot" can complete many orders of magnitude more than any human lawyer. (I'm also not a lawyer and have no idea if this line of thinking is applicable.)

[deleted]

Re: DoNotPay has to pay $193K for falsely touting untested AI lawyer, FTC says

#14

Post by manofmanysmiles »

It's amazing to me that people think they need other people to resolve disputes, or that "law" is some kind of magic...

And yet people keep thinking so, both selling it as magic, and buying it as magic, and not once taking the time to consider what the words on the paper might mean.

Re: DoNotPay has to pay $193K for falsely touting untested AI lawyer, FTC says

#15

Post by ziddoap »

ahmeneeroe-v2 wrote: post #12
sixhobbits wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

DoNotPay predates GPT by quite a bit -- it used to be pretty positively received on HN e.g. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13822289

Yes! I used this "AI" tool to help a friend write a letter to her landlord. It was not at all "generative AI" and seemed to just paste modules together based on her answers to its questionnaire. To your second point, it's very funny how OpenAI seems to have soured the tech crowd on tech.

>To your second point, it's very funny how OpenAI seems to have soured the tech crowd on tech.

In this particular case, I'm not sour because of OpenAI. I am sour because of deceptive and gross business practices highlighted in the article.

Re: DoNotPay has to pay $193K for falsely touting untested AI lawyer, FTC says

#16

Post by ryandrake »

ziddoap wrote: post #4

> DoNotPay also did not "hire or retain any attorneys" to help verify AI outputs or validate DoNotPay's legal claims. Wow, that's brave. Create a wrapper around ChatGPT, call it a lawyer, and never check the output. $193k fine seems like peanuts. Sometimes I think about where I would be in life if I had no moral or ethical qualms. I'd probably be running a company like this.

> Sometimes I think about where I would be in life if I had no moral or ethical qualms. I'd probably be running a company like this.

I think about this all the time. If I didn’t have a conscience, I would be retired by now.

Re: DoNotPay has to pay $193K for falsely touting untested AI lawyer, FTC says

#17

Post by thfuran »

ahmeneeroe-v2 wrote: post #12
sixhobbits wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

DoNotPay predates GPT by quite a bit -- it used to be pretty positively received on HN e.g. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13822289

Yes! I used this "AI" tool to help a friend write a letter to her landlord. It was not at all "generative AI" and seemed to just paste modules together based on her answers to its questionnaire. To your second point, it's very funny how OpenAI seems to have soured the tech crowd on tech.

Wasn't the tech crowd getting soured on tech by all the ads eating the world?

Re: DoNotPay has to pay $193K for falsely touting untested AI lawyer, FTC says

#18

Post by whiplash451 »

ryandrake wrote: post #16
ziddoap wrote: post #4

> DoNotPay also did not "hire or retain any attorneys" to help verify AI outputs or validate DoNotPay's legal claims. Wow, that's brave. Create a wrapper around ChatGPT, call it a lawyer, and never check the output. $193k fine seems like peanuts. Sometimes I think about where I would be in life if I had no moral or ethical qualms. I'd probably be running a company like this.

> Sometimes I think about where I would be in life if I had no moral or ethical qualms. I'd probably be running a company like this. I think about this all the time. If I didn’t have a conscience, I would be retired by now.

You might be retiring in jail, though.

Re: DoNotPay has to pay $193K for falsely touting untested AI lawyer, FTC says

#19

Post by [deleted] »

ryandrake wrote: post #16
ziddoap wrote: post #4

> DoNotPay also did not "hire or retain any attorneys" to help verify AI outputs or validate DoNotPay's legal claims. Wow, that's brave. Create a wrapper around ChatGPT, call it a lawyer, and never check the output. $193k fine seems like peanuts. Sometimes I think about where I would be in life if I had no moral or ethical qualms. I'd probably be running a company like this.

> Sometimes I think about where I would be in life if I had no moral or ethical qualms. I'd probably be running a company like this. I think about this all the time. If I didn’t have a conscience, I would be retired by now.

[deleted]
Post reply on HN