A group of researchers have defended their claim that Irish High Court and Supreme Court judges use Wikipedia as a source in important rulings.
According to a paper published by academics from Maynooth and MIT last month, Irish judges are commonly influenced in their legal decisions and language by the free online encyclopaedia. If true, this would be significant, as Wikipedia allows any user to suggest changes and edits to its entries, meaning controversial subjects could be more likely to be subject to potential inaccuracies and personal bias.
As reported by the Independent.ie, the academics involved claim that “linguistic fingerprints” show that the judges in question were using Wikipedia to reach their final judgements.
A piece in the Irish Independent on criticism by High Court judges of our Wikipedia-and-judges research https://t.co/yQyabqCIaT
— Brian Flanagan (@BrianFl38315947) August 23, 2022
“It is not cut and paste,” said Maynooth Associate Professor of Law, Dr. Brian Flanagan. “But they are using phrases and terms that could only have come into their head if they were just after reading the Wikipedia summary.”
Flanagan added that this was dangerous, as it could manipulate the outcome of important legal cases.
“A well-resourced litigant could encourage his legal team to anonymously integrate their own analysis of a relevant precedent into a Wikipedia article at an early stage of litigation in the hope of later attracting the attention of the judge or his clerk,” he said.
“It’s difficult to quantify the risk of such a practice. But given known trends in online misinformation and the relative openness of Wikipedia’s content to general internet users, it is possible to imagine scenarios in which it might surface.”
The researchers behind the paper claim that this problem is most common in judgements from the Irish High Court, but was also present in the Supreme Court and other legal settings.
However, many in the justice system pushed back strongly against the claims, with one judge reportedly raising questions about the group’s methodology.
But Flanagan – a co-author of the study – has stood by the findings, saying the judges reaction was “understandable, but mistaken.”
He said that the work was conducted using a “randomised control trial,” examining 154 Supreme Court precedents, and taking 5 years to complete.
“By doing this across a large set of cases, we knew that any difference in how judges used them could only be due to their inclusion or not in Wikipedia,” he said.
According to the findings, a legal precedent was 20% more likely to be cited by the High Court if there was a Wikipedia article on it.
Flanagan expressed some sympathy, saying “Judges are human and are confronted with overfilled dockets, and so they might be tempted to use Wikipedia.
“Our research also shows that the argumentation in judicial decisions is itself influenced by the argumentation presented in Wikipedia. Legal decisions should be based on carefully-considered expertise about what laws and precedents say, and never be at the mercy of internet ghost-writers.”
Judges are human and are confronted with overfilled dockets, and so they might be tempted to use Wikipedia. https://t.co/N09cO1D25I 1/4
— Brian Flanagan (@BrianFl38315947) July 27, 2022