8 in 10 Korean judges have seen AI invent court cases

South Korea's Supreme Court published a survey Monday of 360 judges, conducted October 6–16 among civil, family and administrative judges: 80.7 percent had encountered citations of precedents that do not exist, 65.4 percent had seen false accounts of real precedents, and 16.9 percent had seen false or nonexistent laws.

The bench is implicated too: 164 judges acknowledged having themselves cited false precedents, while 57.6 percent said lawyers representing parties had cited false precedents or other AI-generated inaccurate information.

Nearly 92 percent of respondents said institutional measures are urgently needed, including legal grounds for fines, mandatory verification before submissions, and disciplinary mechanisms for lawyers who repeatedly file false information. The National Court Administration warned the fake citations risk delaying proceedings.