I need to tell you something that might change how you use your phone tonight.

A federal judge ruled earlier this year that when you type your private legal questions into an AI chatbot, those conversations are not protected by attorney-client privilege. They are not work product. They are discoverable.

That means if your spouse’s lawyer asks for them, a court can make you hand them over.

Let that sink in for a second.

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The Midnight Search That Blows Up Your Case

Here is how it happens. You are stressed. It is midnight. You cannot sleep. So you open ChatGPT or Claude or Grok and you type the thing you would never say out loud in a courtroom.

Will my spouse find out about my affair?

How do I hide this bank account?

Can they find out about the money I moved to my sister’s name?

What happens if I don’t disclose my crypto?

You just created a record of the very thing you were trying to hide. And you handed it to a platform that stores your data, has no duty of confidentiality to you, and can be compelled to produce it.

If you had asked me that same question in my office at 5100 Poplar, it would be privileged. Protected. Between us. But you did not ask me. You asked a chatbot. And a chatbot is not your lawyer.

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Why This Is Not Hypothetical Anymore

Courts are waking up to AI fast. The Sixth Circuit (that is our appellate court here in Tennessee) just sanctioned two Tennessee attorneys $30,000 for filing briefs full of fabricated case citations that bore the hallmarks of AI hallucinations. The court asked them point blank whether they used AI. They refused to answer. It did not end well.

Judges are not afraid of AI. But they are paying very close attention to it. And if courts are now comfortable ordering lawyers to disclose whether they used AI, it is only a matter of time before they start looking at what clients typed into these tools during discovery.

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What to Do Instead

If you have a question about your divorce, your custody situation, or your finances, call your attorney. That is the entire point of privilege. The conversation stays between us. William W. Jones IV has been handling family law cases in Memphis and across the Mid-South since 2002, and I promise you, whatever you need to ask at midnight, I have heard worse.

You can use AI to look up general legal concepts. That is fine. “What is a parenting plan in Tennessee” is harmless. But the moment you start typing your own facts, your own finances, your own secrets into that box, you have created something that can be used against you.

And you will not know it happened until you are sitting in a deposition and opposing counsel reads your own chatbot conversation back to you.

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Lawyer Bill’s Advice

AI is not your lawyer. It cannot keep a secret.

If you would not write it on a billboard on Poplar Avenue, do not type it into a chatbot.

The things you want to hide are exactly the things you need to tell your attorney.

Not a machine. Your attorney.

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If you have questions, reach out to William W. Jones IV at midsouthdivorce.com/ask-lawyer-bill/.