AI Tool from University of Surrey Aims to Make Justice More Transparent
Researchers at the University of Surrey have developed a groundbreaking artificial intelligence (AI) transcription tool designed to enhance transparency and accessibility in the UK’s Supreme Court hearings.
The system, built by the university’s language and translation technologies team, automatically transcribes courtroom proceedings using speech recognition tailored to the unique language of British legal settings.
According to a recent study, the tool—trained on 139 hours of Supreme Court hearings and official legal documents—achieved up to 9% fewer transcription errors than leading commercial systems such as Google or Microsoft.
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Modernising an Outdated System
Professor Constantin Orăsan, co-author of the study, said the project highlights how technology can help modernise the justice system.
“Our courts handle some of society’s most significant issues, but the way we record and access those hearings is outdated,” he said.
“By training AI on the distinct terminology and structure of legal debates, we’ve created a tool that can make justice more transparent, accurate, and accessible to everyone.”
The innovation addresses a long-standing challenge in legal transcription: capturing complex legal language and overlapping speech with precision—something general-purpose AI tools often struggle with.
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Beyond Transcription: Smarter Legal Access
The second stage of the project goes a step further. The AI not only transcribes hearings but can semantically match paragraphs of written judgments with the exact timestamps in court videos where those arguments occurred.
This means legal professionals, journalists, or the public can instantly locate the relevant moment in a video that corresponds to a specific legal argument—eliminating hours of manual searching.
The feature could prove transformative for archiving, research, and public accountability, especially as more court hearings are streamed online.
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Interest from National Institutions
The University of Surrey confirmed that the system has already drawn attention from both the UK Supreme Court and the National Archives, who see potential for integrating the AI into their official documentation and public record systems.
Researchers hope the technology can eventually be adopted more widely across UK courts, paving the way for a digitally empowered justice system that is easier to navigate, study, and scrutinize.
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A Step Toward Open Justice
The initiative forms part of a broader push to bring AI and automation into legal processes, aiming to make court proceedings not only more efficient but also more transparent to the public.
By bridging the gap between legal language and technology, the University of Surrey’s team believes this innovation could mark a significant leap toward open justice in the digital era.
