How AI is powering legal research at CanLII

CanLII is harnessing the power of artificial intelligence to help simplify and optimize legal research with its new AI research tool, Search+. The tool is designed to convert plain language questions into a structured Boolean query and to analyze results for the most relevant documents from case law, legislation and commentary available on CanLII. 

A Boolean search query relies on a combination of words and phrases such as “AND,” “OR,” or “NOT,” as well as quotation marks and parentheses, to narrow down search results. While it is powerful and precise, it is not intuitive and most people who use CanLII do not necessarily know how to craft these queries.

In this episode of LawCast BC, we chat with Francis Barragan, President and CEO of CanLII and Emma Elliott, Vice President of Operations at Lexum, the firm that developed Search+. They explain what problems the tool solves, how it actually works and how it differs from other AI tools that are more prone to hallucinations or errors. We also walk through a couple of live demos with real-life prompts, demonstrating the power of the tool to analyze and score results based on relevancy. 

CanLII's entire technological platform is designed and maintained by Lexum, a legal technology firm that is owned by CanLII. Lexum continuously improves upon CanLII’s software infrastructure, including with the creation of Search+. 

Resources:

• Information about the CanLII Search+ research assistant
• Future updates about the Search+ tool can be found on the CanLII blog