Can I use ChatGPT to prepare documents for an Australian court?

Yes, but you answer for every citation. None of the four directions on this page bans generative AI for submissions; each puts verification on the person who files, and the Supreme Court of New South Wales prohibits it for generating the content of affidavits and witness statements. In the Federal Circuit and Family Court, disclosure is not required unless the court asks. Recent decisions show the cost of skipping the check: a lawyer in the Federal Circuit and Family Court was ordered to pay costs of $9,600 personally after six hallucinated authorities in judicial review submissions (14 September 2026).

How many cases of fictitious or AI-generated citations have Australian courts recorded?

112 of the 2,202 public records in the AI Vortex corpus (5.1%) come from Australian courts and tribunals, counted by script on the corpus refreshed 2026-10-23. The earliest is dated May 8, 2023 and the most recent Sep 15, 2026. The corpus counts decisions that discuss suspected AI-generated content; it is not a complete census of every Australian matter.

What do Australian court practice directions say about AI-generated citations?

All four directions on this page put verification on the person who files. The Federal Court says: "The presentation of false or inaccurate information to the Court is unacceptable." The Federal Circuit and Family Court requires users to "verify that any reference to case law, legislation, textbooks or articles in content produced by GenAI exists and stands for the legal principles that is attributed to it." The Supreme Court of New South Wales requires authors of submissions that used Gen AI to verify that citations "exist, (b) are accurate, and (c) are relevant to the proceedings" and adds: "Such verification must not be solely carried out by using a Gen AI tool or program." The Supreme Court of Victoria says: "it is not sufficient verification to ask an AI tool to confirm that the materials exist or contain the content that GenAI says they do."

Do you have to disclose AI use in an Australian court?

It depends on the court. The Federal Circuit and Family Court says: "There is no requirement for a court user, other than an expert witness, to disclose by way of statement, certification or otherwise the use of GenAI in the preparation of a document filed or relied on in a proceeding, unless requested to do so." The Federal Court says: "If the Court requires it, a person must disclose to the Court if (and how) Generative AI has been used in a proceeding." and lists evidence cases where disclosure is required. In the Supreme Court of New South Wales, submissions that used Gen AI must carry the verification statement and affidavits must carry a disclosure that Gen AI was not used to generate their content. In the Supreme Court of Victoria, "Court users must be prepared to identify the specific portions of Court documents which were produced using AI and be able to explain how the output was verified."

Who files fictitious citations in Australian courts?

Mostly self-represented parties: 86 of the 112 Australian records involve a self-represented litigant and 22 involve a lawyer; 4 involve another participant or no party recorded.

What happens when a party files fake cases in an Australian court?

The directions say what a court may do. The Federal Court: "Where Generative AI is used in way that is inconsistent with this Practice Note or the Court’s orders or directions, all persons should expect that there could be consequences including adverse costs orders and issues as to compliance with legal and professional obligations." The Federal Circuit and Family Court lists disregarding the material, an order for costs or other penalty, or referral to a regulatory body. In the corpus, 63 Australian records show no sanction, 22 a warning, 15 a monetary sanction or costs award, 0 a filing struck and 10 a referral to a law society. A record can list several outcomes.

HomeTopicsAustralia

Country view · primary sources · corpus counts

ChatGPT and AI in Australian courts: what the rules say and what happened in recent cases

You may use ChatGPT or another generative AI tool to prepare a court document in Australia, but you answer for every citation: none of the four courts below bans it for submissions, and the Supreme Court of New South Wales bars it from generating the content of affidavits and witness statements. 112 Australian records in our corpus show what happens when invented cases get filed; directions read on October 23, 2026, counts computed from the corpus refreshed 2026-10-23.

FCFCOA practice direction All Australian records

In the corpus

112 of 2,202 public records (5.1%) come from Australian courts and tribunals.

A record counts for a country when its jurisdiction cell lists that country, the same rule the country profile uses (lib/jurisdictions.mjs). Party, court, outcome and year are read from the structured fields of each public record; counts are computed at build time from the corpus file the case pages use. Latest tracked decision in the whole corpus: 2026-10-15.

Current directions, with dates and primary sources

Newest first. Each name links to the court's own text; the right-hand column summarises what that text says about disclosure.

Court and instrument	Issued	Applies to	Disclosure
Practice Direction PD-AI Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia (Divisions 1 and 2)	29 May 2026	Litigants, self-represented litigants, lawyers, experts and all other court users	No duty to disclose unless the court asks; be ready to explain whether AI was used, which tool, and how output was checked
Practice Note SC Gen 25 Supreme Court of Victoria	14 May 2026	All court users: lawyers, litigants, lay and expert witnesses	Court may direct further information; be ready to identify the AI-produced portions and how they were verified
Practice Note GPN-AI Federal Court of Australia	16 April 2026	Everyone who appears before or files documents with the Court, represented or not, including witnesses and subpoena recipients	Disclose if the Court requires it, and in listed evidence cases (para 4.10)
Practice Note SC Gen 23 Supreme Court of New South Wales	28 January 2025 (in force 3 February 2025)	All proceedings; closed-source and open-source tools	Verification statement in submissions that used Gen AI; affidavits must state Gen AI was not used to generate their content

Other Australian courts and tribunals publish their own instruments; this page covers only these four. The Supreme Court of Victoria note replaced its Guidelines for Litigants of May 2024. Check the forum where you file.

Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia (PD-AI)

The Practice Direction applies to all proceedings in Division 1 and Division 2. On checking what the tool produced:

verify that any reference to case law, legislation, textbooks or articles in content produced by GenAI exists and stands for the legal principles that is attributed to it.

On disclosure:

There is no requirement for a court user, other than an expert witness, to disclose by way of statement, certification or otherwise the use of GenAI in the preparation of a document filed or relied on in a proceeding, unless requested to do so.

Paragraph 4.11 adds that the person responsible should be able to explain whether AI was used, what tool was used, how the output was checked and supervised, and how the direction's principles were observed. On what a court may do:

The Court has broad discretionary powers to respond to instances of inappropriate use of GenAI which may include disregarding material placed before the Court, an order for costs or other penalty, or referral to a regulatory body.

Federal Court of Australia (GPN-AI)

The Practice Note of April 16, 2026 names fictitious citations among the results users should expect from Generative AI:

fictitious cases, citations or quotes, or references to legal sources that do not exist by reason of hallucinations or for any other reason;

The presentation of false or inaccurate information to the Court is unacceptable.

Where AI was used to prepare documents, the Court expects the responsible person to have confirmed, among other things, that:

legal authorities cited in submissions exist and support the proposition stated;

On disclosure and consequences:

If the Court requires it, a person must disclose to the Court if (and how) Generative AI has been used in a proceeding.

Where Generative AI is used in way that is inconsistent with this Practice Note or the Court’s orders or directions, all persons should expect that there could be consequences including adverse costs orders and issues as to compliance with legal and professional obligations.

Supreme Court of New South Wales (SC Gen 23)

Practice Note SC Gen 23 was issued on January 28, 2025 and applies to all proceedings from February 3, 2025. Paragraph 16, on written submissions:

Where Gen AI has been used in the preparation of written submissions or summaries or skeletons of argument, the author must verify in the body of the submissions, summaries or skeleton, that all citations, legal and academic authority and case law and legislative references: (a) exist, (b) are accurate, and (c) are relevant to the proceedings,

Such verification must not be solely carried out by using a Gen AI tool or program.

It goes furthest on evidence, prohibiting Gen AI in generating the content of affidavits and witness statements (paragraph 10):

Gen AI must not be used in generating the content of affidavits, witness statements, character references or other material that is intended to reflect the deponent or witness’ evidence and/or opinion, or other material tendered in evidence or used in cross examination.

Supreme Court of Victoria (SC Gen 25)

Practice Note SC Gen 25 was issued and commenced on May 14, 2026.

Court users are responsible for the content of their Court documents. This is the case whether or not a Court user has utilised AI.

it is not sufficient verification to ask an AI tool to confirm that the materials exist or contain the content that GenAI says they do.

Court users must be prepared to identify the specific portions of Court documents which were produced using AI and be able to explain how the output was verified.

Lawyers should be aware that if they rely on unverified AI outputs in Court documents they may be referred to the Victorian Legal Services Board and Commissioner and may be subject to personal costs orders.

Three recent decisions, read from the judgment

Each was read on October 23, 2026 from the judgment text. Parties who are individuals are not named; the link goes to the judgment and the second link to our record.

Dey v Minister for Immigration and Citizenship (No 2) [2026] FedCFamC2G 1799

Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia (Division 2) · 14 September 2026

A lawyer admitted that six authorities in the judicial review submissions and five in the first costs submissions were hallucinations, and did so only after the Court asked whether they existed. The Court ordered the lawyer personally to pay the Minister's costs fixed at $9,600 and decided not to refer the lawyer to the regulator; being named in the reasons and orders was treated as a public reprimand.

The Court expects that a lawyer will use their expertise and ensure that the authorities relied upon in submissions do in fact exist and are not a mere hallucination of a generative AI program.

Judgment text · Our record of this decision

Egan v Commonwealth of Australia [2026] FCA 1104

Federal Court of Australia · 11 August 2026

A self-represented applicant accepted that he used generative AI for supplementary submissions and did not adequately verify the references and quotations. The Court found a quoted passage attributed to a High Court decision did not exist and checked it against the authorised reports and the other published versions. The application was dismissed on summary judgment with costs because it had no reasonable prospect of success, not because of the AI errors.

The purported quoted passage does not exist.

Judgment text · Our record of this decision

MFRD and National Disability Insurance Agency (NDIS) [2026] ARTA 1833

Administrative Review Tribunal · 26 August 2026

The applicant's non-lawyer representative filed written submissions citing decisions that did not exist. The Member did not penalise anyone, noting the Tribunal's AI practice direction was not yet in place, but cut the weight of the submission and set the agency's decision aside and remitted it.

requiring me to effectively disregard some sections in their entirety, and to approach the other parts with considerable circumspection.

Judgment text · Our record of this decision

The judgment copies are the AustLII texts as hosted by the AI Hallucination Cases database; austlii.edu.au itself and the Federal Court site refused our server, so we could not open them there.

Who filed the fictitious citations

Party recorded	Records
Self-represented litigant	86
Lawyer	22
Other (expert, decision-maker, not recorded)	4

Every instrument above applies to self-represented litigants as well as lawyers. See also pro se litigants across the corpus.

Courts and tribunals with the most records

Labels as recorded in each case; court and tribunal names are not merged.

Court or tribunal	Records
Fair Work Commission	13
Federal Circuit and Family Court	9
Federal Court	8
Queensland IRC	7
Family Court	5
Administrative Review Tribunal	4
NSW	3
Victorian CAT	3

What the 112 Australian records list as outcomes

Outcome type (a record can list several)	Records
No sanction recorded	63
Warning	22
Monetary sanction or costs	15
Case or appeal dismissed	12
Referral to a law society	10
Professional discipline	4

By decision year: 2023: 1, 2024: 4, 2025: 51, 2026: 56. 19 records name the AI tool; the rest say AI use was implied or not identified.

Records to read first

Lawyer records first, because they are rarer, then the most recent. Each links to the full record.

Dey v Minister for Immigration and Citizenship (No 2)Federal Circuit and Family Court · Sep 14, 2026 · LawyerRead the record EML (a pseudonym) v AFT (a pseudonym) [2026] VCC 734County Court of Victoria · May 28, 2026 · LawyerRead the record Applications by BGIS Pty LtdFair Work Commission · May 8, 2026 · LawyerRead the record Neill-Fraser v Tasmania Parole BoardSupreme Court of Tasmania · Sep 15, 2026 · Party not recordedRead the record MFRD and National Disability Insurance AgencyARTA · Aug 26, 2026 · Pro Se LitigantRead the record Heywood v State of Queensland (Department of Education)Queensland IRC · Aug 24, 2026 · Pro Se LitigantRead the record

Browse all 112 Australian records · Fake citations across every country

Before you rely on this

The Federal Circuit and Family Court page and the Federal Court page did not load from our server. For those two, the text above was read from Internet Archive captures of the court pages ( June 9, 2026 and August 14, 2026); the issue dates shown are the ones printed on those pages. Re-read the live pages before citing them, because practice directions change. The NSW and Victorian texts were read on the courts' own sites on October 23, 2026; for NSW, the court's published PDF is the January 2025 version, and we did not check for amendments after it.

Counts reflect the structured fields of each public record, not a fresh reading of every decision, and they are not usage-adjusted rates. Read the decision itself before citing it. Nothing here is legal advice.

Primary sources

Questions this page answers

Can I use ChatGPT to prepare documents for an Australian court?: Yes, but you answer for every citation. None of the four directions on this page bans generative AI for submissions; each puts verification on the person who files, and the Supreme Court of New South Wales prohibits it for generating the content of affidavits and witness statements. In the Federal Circuit and Family Court, disclosure is not required unless the court asks. Recent decisions show the cost of skipping the check: a lawyer in the Federal Circuit and Family Court was ordered to pay costs of $9,600 personally after six hallucinated authorities in judicial review submissions (14 September 2026).
What do recent Australian decisions say about AI-generated citations?: Three decisions read from the judgment text: Dey v Minister for Immigration and Citizenship (No 2) [2026] FedCFamC2G 1799 (14 September 2026); Egan v Commonwealth of Australia [2026] FCA 1104 (11 August 2026); MFRD and National Disability Insurance Agency (NDIS) [2026] ARTA 1833 (26 August 2026). A lawyer paid costs personally, a self-represented applicant's quoted passage was found not to exist, and a tribunal cut the weight of submissions citing decisions that did not exist.
How many cases of fictitious or AI-generated citations have Australian courts recorded?: 112 of the 2,202 public records in the AI Vortex corpus (5.1%) come from Australian courts and tribunals, counted by script on the corpus refreshed 2026-10-23. The earliest is dated May 8, 2023 and the most recent Sep 15, 2026. The corpus counts decisions that discuss suspected AI-generated content; it is not a complete census of every Australian matter.
What do Australian court practice directions say about AI-generated citations?: All four directions on this page put verification on the person who files. The Federal Court says: "The presentation of false or inaccurate information to the Court is unacceptable." The Federal Circuit and Family Court requires users to "verify that any reference to case law, legislation, textbooks or articles in content produced by GenAI exists and stands for the legal principles that is attributed to it." The Supreme Court of New South Wales requires authors of submissions that used Gen AI to verify that citations "exist, (b) are accurate, and (c) are relevant to the proceedings" and adds: "Such verification must not be solely carried out by using a Gen AI tool or program." The Supreme Court of Victoria says: "it is not sufficient verification to ask an AI tool to confirm that the materials exist or contain the content that GenAI says they do."
Do you have to disclose AI use in an Australian court?: It depends on the court. The Federal Circuit and Family Court says: "There is no requirement for a court user, other than an expert witness, to disclose by way of statement, certification or otherwise the use of GenAI in the preparation of a document filed or relied on in a proceeding, unless requested to do so." The Federal Court says: "If the Court requires it, a person must disclose to the Court if (and how) Generative AI has been used in a proceeding." and lists evidence cases where disclosure is required. In the Supreme Court of New South Wales, submissions that used Gen AI must carry the verification statement and affidavits must carry a disclosure that Gen AI was not used to generate their content. In the Supreme Court of Victoria, "Court users must be prepared to identify the specific portions of Court documents which were produced using AI and be able to explain how the output was verified."
Who files fictitious citations in Australian courts?: Mostly self-represented parties: 86 of the 112 Australian records involve a self-represented litigant and 22 involve a lawyer; 4 involve another participant or no party recorded.
What happens when a party files fake cases in an Australian court?: The directions say what a court may do. The Federal Court: "Where Generative AI is used in way that is inconsistent with this Practice Note or the Court’s orders or directions, all persons should expect that there could be consequences including adverse costs orders and issues as to compliance with legal and professional obligations." The Federal Circuit and Family Court lists disregarding the material, an order for costs or other penalty, or referral to a regulatory body. In the corpus, 63 Australian records show no sanction, 22 a warning, 15 a monetary sanction or costs award, 0 a filing struck and 10 a referral to a law society. A record can list several outcomes.