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Florida Bar Ethics Opinion 24-1 (lawyers' use of generative artificial intelligence)

Record US-FL-16 · Florida Bar Ethics Opinion 24-1

Issued by
The Florida Bar (Board Review Committee on Professional Ethics, at the direction of the Board of Governors)
Jurisdiction
Florida (US)
Level · region
Sub-national · North America
Country
United States
Published / adopted
2024-01-19
Language
English
Official identifier
Florida Bar Ethics Opinion 24-1

Summary

Advisory ethics opinion of The Florida Bar on lawyers' use of generative AI. Lawyers may use it but must protect client confidentiality, researching a program's policies on data retention, data sharing and self-learning, and should obtain informed consent before disclosing confidential information to a third-party program. They must verify the accuracy and sufficiency of AI research, set oversight policies as for nonlawyer assistants, not delegate the practice of law to it, and not inflate billed time. Chatbots that communicate with clients or third parties must follow advertising rules and disclose that they are an AI program, not a lawyer or employee.

Safety topics

human oversightaccountability & liabilitytransparency & labelling

Scope

Borderline scope An advisory, non-binding opinion of The Florida Bar, which is the professional association of Florida lawyers but also administers their professional conduct rules; included for that regulatory role, as guidance to all Florida Bar members on using generative AI under those rules.

Status notes

The Florida Bar's Board of Governors directed the Board Review Committee on Professional Ethics to issue the opinion. It applies the Rules Regulating The Florida Bar on confidentiality (4-1.6), competence (4-1.1), supervision of nonlawyer assistants (4-5.3), fees (4-1.5) and advertising (subchapter 4-7) to generative AI, and draws on earlier Florida opinions on cloud computing, electronic storage, remote paralegal services and metadata. It notes that confidentiality concerns may be reduced by an in-house generative AI, and that no informed consent is needed when no confidential information is disclosed to a third party. The opinion states that advisory ethics opinions are not binding.

Sources

Open the official source https://www.floridabar.org/etopinions/opinion-24-1/

Secondary source: https://www.law.buffalo.edu/content/dam/law/content/cle/24mar27-materials/fl-bar-ethics.pdf

Local copy

Partial (secondary source only). The official source could not be downloaded (HTTP 403 Forbidden); only the secondary source was saved. The browser retry also failed (HTTP 403 (in browser)). Last attempt 2026-10-17 23:09:52 UTC

Secondary source (third-party copy, not published) archive/US-FL-16/2026-10-14/secondary.pdf
Retrieved 2026-10-14 16:39:18 UTC
SHA-256 75048873b09c0cd02c05520e11021923f8800b73677c1f9924004d87ae52533d

Verification

C
Not confirmed on an official page; the record rests on secondary sources. Check it before citing. checked 2026-10-18 · search-confirmed
CAUTION: no official source confirms the title, date and status; the record rests on secondary sources. Recheck of 18 Oct 2026: The Florida Bar's own page for Opinion 24-1 still could not be stored: floridabar.org refused the archiver on 14, 16 and 17 Oct 2026 (HTTP 403, also in the browser retry). Re-read the copy of the full opinion text in continuing legal education materials on law.buffalo.edu (University at Buffalo School of Law), stored on 14 Oct 2026 and found unchanged on 17 Oct 2026, which carries the heading 'FLORIDA BAR ETHICS OPINION OPINION 24-1', the date and the full text; title, date, status, the summary and the notes rest on this third-party copy. Whether the Bar has revised or withdrawn the opinion since could not be checked against its own site.
Second check: Independent check by Claude Code (claude-sonnet-5-5), 2026-10-18: 9 field(s) supported.

History

  1. 2026-10-18scope_note: An advisory, non-binding opinion of The Florida Bar, which administers the profe → An advisory, non-binding opinion of The Florida Bar, which is the professional a — reworded for the public field: it described the register's own scope rules and an undecided scope question ('AGENTS.md section 10', 'inclusive default', 'scope decision'), which the evidence script flags as process language; the open scope question moved to open_questions2026-10-18-recheck-north-america-2 · Claude Code (claude-opus-5-5)
  2. 2026-10-14Added to the register — found in pipeline run 2026-10-14-discover-codes-us-fl, candidate C017 (US-FL/supervisors)2026-10-14-discover-codes-us-fl · Claude Code (claude-opus-5-5)

Related records

Florida Bar conduct rules: generative AI comments (2024) Florida (US) · In force

Citation

The Florida Bar (Board Review Committee on Professional Ethics, at the direction of the Board of Governors). Florida Bar Ethics Opinion 24-1 (lawyers' use of generative artificial intelligence) [Florida Bar Ethics Opinion 24-1]. 2024-01-19. https://www.floridabar.org/etopinions/opinion-24-1/. Status: Published (non-binding, current); verified 2026-10-18 (level C). Local copy archive/US-FL-16/2026-10-14/secondary.pdf retrieved 2026-10-14 16:39:18 UTC, SHA-256 75048873b09c0cd02c05520e11021923f8800b73677c1f9924004d87ae52533d. Every AI Policy Ever, version 1.18 (snapshot 2026-10-18), record US-FL-16.

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