Fictitious citations in Canadian courts
Public Canadian decisions that deal with fictitious or AI-generated citations: who filed them, which courts and tribunals, what the decision-maker did, and what the Federal Court of Canada asks of anyone who uses AI. Notice read on ; counts computed from the corpus refreshed 2026-10-23.
In the corpus
233 of 2,202 public records (10.6%) come from Canadian 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.
Who filed the fictitious citations
| Party recorded | Records |
|---|---|
| Self-represented litigant | 182 |
| Lawyer | 49 |
| Other (expert, decision-maker) | 2 |
The Federal Court notes that the duties of counsel as officers of the Court do not extend to people representing themselves, which is why its notice applies to every party. See also pro se litigants across the corpus.
Courts and tribunals with the most records
Labels as recorded in each case; tribunal names are not merged.
| Court or tribunal | Records |
|---|---|
| Federal Court | 19 |
| BC CRT | 13 |
| Ontario SCJ | 12 |
| HRT Ontario | 9 |
| Civil Resolution Tribunal | 7 |
| SC British Columbia | 7 |
| BC WCAT | 6 |
| ONCAT | 5 |
What the 233 Canadian records list as outcomes
| Outcome type (a record can list several) | Records |
|---|---|
| No sanction recorded | 133 |
| Warning | 39 |
| Monetary sanction or costs | 49 |
| Filing struck | 7 |
| Case or appeal dismissed | 7 |
| Referral to a law society | 3 |
| Professional discipline | 2 |
By decision year: 2024: 7, 2025: 98, 2026: 128. 22 records name the AI tool; the rest say AI use was implied or not identified.
What the Federal Court of Canada requires
From the Notice to the Parties and the Profession of May 7, 2024, which updated the notice of December 20, 2023. Quoted from the PDF read on October 23, 2026.
The Court expects parties to proceedings before the Court to inform it, and each other, if documents they submit to the Court, that have been prepared for the purposes of litigation, include content created or generated by artificial intelligence (“AI”).
The declaration goes in the first paragraph of the document. The notice's sample:
Artificial intelligence (AI) was used to generate content in this document at paragraphs 20-30.
On fabricated authorities and checking them:
“Hallucination” is a term used to refer to facts, citations, and other content generated by AI that are not true, and have been fabricated by AI in response to a prompt or request.
When referring to jurisprudence, statutes, policies, or commentaries in documents submitted to the Court, it is crucial to use only well-recognized and reliable sources.
The Court urges verification of any AI-created content in these documents.
In this regard, the party signing a document submitted to the Court bears responsibility for the accuracy and veracity of its contents.
Other Canadian courts and tribunals publish their own practice directions; this page quotes only the Federal Court notice. Check the rules of the forum where you file.
Records to read first
Lawyer records first, because they are rarer, then the most recent.
Browse all 233 Canadian records · Fake citations across every country
Before you rely on this
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 (read October 23, 2026)
Questions this page answers
- How many cases of fictitious citations have Canadian courts recorded?
- 233 of the 2,202 public records in the AI Vortex corpus (10.6%) come from Canadian courts and tribunals, counted by script on the corpus refreshed 2026-10-23. The earliest is dated Feb 20, 2024 and the most recent Oct 1, 2026. The corpus counts decisions that discuss suspected AI-generated content; it is not a complete census of every Canadian matter.
- Who files fictitious citations in Canadian courts?
- Mostly self-represented parties: 182 of the 233 Canadian records involve a self-represented litigant and 49 involve a lawyer; 2 involve another participant such as an expert or a decision-maker.
- What happens when a party cites fake cases in a Canadian court?
- In 133 Canadian records no sanction is recorded, 39 record a warning and 49 record a monetary sanction or a costs award. 7 record a filing struck, 7 a case or appeal dismissed and 3 a referral to a law society. A record can list several outcomes.
- Do you have to declare AI use in the Federal Court of Canada?
- Yes, for content generated by AI. The Federal Court's notice of May 7, 2024 says: "The Court expects parties to proceedings before the Court to inform it, and each other, if documents they submit to the Court, that have been prepared for the purposes of litigation, include content created or generated by artificial intelligence (“AI”)." The declaration goes in the first paragraph of the document, and the notice adds: "The Court confirms that the inclusion of a Declaration, in and of itself, will not attract an adverse inference by the Court."
- Who is responsible for checking citations generated by AI?
- The person who signs the document. The same notice says: "In this regard, the party signing a document submitted to the Court bears responsibility for the accuracy and veracity of its contents." It also says: "The Court urges verification of any AI-created content in these documents."