A June 2026 feature on the rise of self-represented litigants using AI drew on Courtready’s database of fictitious citations in Canadian courts.
On June 29, 2026, The Economist published a business feature titled The Rise of Vibe Lawyering. The piece looks at how artificial intelligence is encouraging more people to argue their own cases in court, and at what goes wrong when AI tools invent the law. For the Canadian picture, the magazine cited Courtready’s research.
“Courtready, a legal-technology platform, reports that Canadian courts have flagged non-existent cases in 79 rulings so far this year, against seven in all of 2024. Most false citations have been made by people representing themselves.”
The Economist, “The Rise of Vibe Lawyering” (June 29, 2026)Those figures come from Courtready’s live database of AI-hallucinated citations in Canadian courts and tribunals. This database logs every reported decision in Canada in which a judge or adjudicator has flagged a case that does not exist. It also confirms the pattern The Economist described: most of these citations come from people representing themselves, not from lawyers. The data is bilingual, public and updated daily.
You can read the full feature in The Economist (subscription required).