USA Law and Practice Contributed by: Trevor Keenan, Michelle Byers and Curtis Berglund, Campbell Conroy & O’Neil, P.C.
3.2 Future Policy in Product Liability and Product Safety Artificial Intelligence (AI) Recent years have seen a significant increase in the use of generative AI globally and across industries, which has raised numerous legal and ethical considerations. Law firms and businesses continue to navigate how to utilise the enormous potential of AI while appropriately implementing it to address concerns, including professional ethics compliance and the adequate safeguard - ing of private client data. The speed of AI’s development, implementa - tion and adoption present challenges to exist - ing legal and regulatory regimes, as does its nature as a non-physical “product” with gen - erative capabilities. The Unites States currently has no legislation or comprehensive regulatory regime to address AI. Policy has been primarily advanced through Executive Orders, and con - tinues to evolve. In this environment, courts will be asked to adapt traditional legal principles to claims that blame AI systems for adverse out - comes. Notable affected areas include: • consumer protection (AI misleading consum - ers); • data protection, privacy and IP (what data can be used by AI or to train AI); and • cybersecurity issues (misuse/abuse of AI tools). Given the evolution of policy priorities on AI and their expected impact on the development and implementation of AI systems, private sec - tor companies utilising AI should monitor these developments.
Legal Challenges to Federal Agency Discretion After Chevron
On 28 June 2024, the US Supreme Court over - turned Chevron USA Inc v Natural Resources Defense Council Inc, a 40-year-old precedent under which courts generally deferred to feder - al agency interpretations of ambiguous statutes under their purview, so long as the interpretation was reasonable. This approach was discarded in Loper Bright v Raimondo and Relentless v Dept of Commerce. Courts may now exercise their independent judgement when deciding whether a federal agency has appropriately exercised its authority, and are no longer required to defer to an agency’s interpretation of an ambiguous stat - ute. This ruling does not call into question past decisions that relied on the Chevron framework. The policy implications of removing the “inter- pretive methodology” of Chevron are significant. Federal agencies will face more challenges to their statutory interpretations, and challengers will have a better chance of prevailing without courts affording deference to an agency’s inter - pretation. The abrogation of Chevron will impact regulatory issues and their adjudication across industries as well as expand the role of the courts in this process.
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