NY Federal Court Judge Says Artificial Intelligence is NOT Your Lawyer and Your Searches Are NOT Protected By Attorney-Client Privilege
On February 17, 2026, Judge Jed S. Rakoff of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York issued a ruling in the matter of United States v. Heppner, 25-cr-00503 (JSR), which carries far-reaching implications for those using generative AI, including LLMs (such as ChatGPT or Claude) and various other AI-assisted tools, for legal purposes.
Specifically, Judge Rakoff held that a criminal defendant’s written exchanges with a publicly available AI chatbot (in this case, Claude) are not protected by either the attorney-client privilege or the attorney work product doctrine, even though the defendant argued he used the tool to help plan his defense after learning he was a target of a federal investigation for securities fraud. The Court noted that, “[w]ithout any suggestion from counsel that he do so, Heppner ‘prepared reports that outlined defense strategy, that outlined what he might argue with respect to the facts and the law that we anticipated that the government might be charging.’ ... Thus, counsel asserted, Heppner ‘was preparing these reports in anticipation of a potential indictment.’” Heppner, at 3. Mr. Heppner specifically tried to assert privilege over documents “(1) Heppner had inputted into Claude, [containing] among other things, information that Heppner had learned from counsel; (2) Heppner had created ... for the purpose of speaking with counsel to obtain legal advice; and (3) Heppner had subsequently shared the contents of ... with counsel.” Heppner, at 3-4.
The Court rejected these arguments, emphasizing that an AI platform is not a lawyer, such that communications with it are bereft of “‘a trusting human relationship,’ such as, in the attorney-client context, a relationship ‘with a licensed professional who owes fiduciary duties and is subject to discipline.’” Heppner, at 6 (citations omitted). The Court further emphasized that the AI provider’s privacy policy made clear that user inputs may be collected, used for training, and shared with third parties (such as “governmental regulatory authorities”), so there is no reasonable expectation of confidentiality. The Court found that “Heppner did not communicate with Claude for the purpose of obtaining legal advice” (Heppner at 7), not acting at the direction of his lawyer, such that “Claude might arguably be said to have functioned in a manner akin to a highly trained professional who may act as a lawyer's agent within the protection of the attorney-client privilege.” Id. (citation omitted). Nor were the AI-generated documents shielded from disclosure under the work product doctrine since the documents were prepared of Mr. Heppner’s own volition and were not prepared at counsel’s behest. Id. at 12.
Thus, querying publicly available generative AI regarding legal issues, using it to draft legal strategies, or pasting a lawyer’s advice into a consumer AI tool, according to this ruling, are not protected by any legal privilege and must be disclosed in an adversarial proceeding. Critically, even if the AI outputs or prompts are shared with counsel, the privilege will apply, and any information fed into the AI platform will be deemed unprivileged since it was voluntarily disclosed to a third party.
This opinion signals that courts may be reluctant to extend traditional confidentiality protections to interactions with mass-market AI tools unless very specific conditions are met, such as the tool is being used under a lawyer’s direction and within a genuinely confidential environment. Individuals and companies should avoid putting sensitive facts, legal strategies, or attorney communications into general-purpose AI platforms and instead work through counsel on how, if at all, AI can safely be integrated into their legal planning.
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