Category Archives: Products liability
Marchant and Buckwald, ‘Private Standards as Liability Shields: A Pro-Innovation Artificial Intelligence Regulatory Approach for States’
ABSTRACT States face a dilemma. The federal government is not regulating artificial intelligence (AI), and is threatening states that regulate the technology with preemption and funding restrictions. Moreover, piecemeal state regulation with different substantive requirements risks impeding AI innovation and harming our national interest and security. And yet, AI creates a whole host of problems […]
Tujjar, Ientile and Toppetti, ‘After the AI Liability Directive: Civil Liability for Healthcare AI and the Limits of EU Risk Regulation’
ABSTRACT Following the withdrawal of the proposed AI Liability Directive in 2025, claims concerning harm caused by healthcare AI continue to be addressed through product liability, national medical liability and sectoral regulation. This article analyses that architecture through three deployment archetypes, a CE-marked radiology triage tool, a machine-learning deterioration score and an ambient clinical scribe, […]
Travis Gilly, ‘The Wrong Verb: Etiological Framing and the AI Psychosis Litigation’
ABSTRACT Seven product liability actions filed against OpenAI in California in November 2025 allege that a chatbot caused psychotic episodes in their users. The peer-reviewed clinical literature on which those claims must ultimately rest does not use that verb. Across research groups at UCSF, Aarhus, the Université de Montréal, and UCLA, investigators describe AI as […]
Mark Geistfeld, ‘Recovering Strict Products Liability for the Age of AI’
ABSTRACT The rule of strict products liability in section 402A of the Restatement (Second) of Torts is widely assumed to have been formulated to address manufacturing defects. Relying on this assumption, the Restatement (Third) of Torts defines manufacturing defects as departures from the product’s design and therefore from the manufacturer’s manifest intent. Because virtually all […]
Catherine Sharkey, ‘Who’s Afraid of Punitive Damages for Products Liability Cases?’
ABSTRACT Products liability cases constitute a new frontier for punitive damages to be awarded where a defendant’s recklessness has caused widespread harm in society. The recognition of punitive damages for reckless conduct in products cases signals a significant move away from the retributive punishment roots of punitive damages awards. The proliferation of punitive damages awards […]
Deimantė Rimkutė, ‘The Regulatory Function of the New Product Liability Directive’
ABSTRACT The year 2024 marked a turning point for EU delict law, as the EU adopted a new Product Liability Directive to replace its 1985 predecessor. The new Directive, however, does more than modernise product liability law. It also reflects a deeper shift in how the EU uses private law as a tool of governance. […]
Jan van Staalduinen, ‘Is There a Manufacturer in the House? On Contractually Shaping European Product Liability for Co-Created Medical AI’
ABSTRACT Hospital AI applications can be developed in several different ways: they can be developed by an external software development company (SDC), they can be developed internally in the hospital, or a hospital can work together with an SDC to jointly develop an AI application. The chosen arrangement has ramifications for the liability of the […]
Luke Meier, ‘The Liability of Online Marketplaces for Tort Injuries in America’
INTRODUCTION More and more, Americans are buying products online rather than at traditional brick and mortal stores. A significant portion of these online purchases occur through ‘online marketplaces’, which are platforms that connects third-party sellers with buyers. The largest online marketplaces are household names – Amazon, Ebay, and Etsy being among the prominent examples. The […]
Beck and Deguire, ‘Toward a Framework for a Law of Electronic Intangibles Liability’
ABSTRACT Products liability law was built for a world of gears, levers, and physical failure. It now confronts a marketplace dominated by software, data, algorithms, and artificial intelligence – objects that do not break, shatter, or wear out, but nevertheless cause real and sometimes catastrophic harm. Courts and commentators increasingly respond to this tension by […]
Hurwitz and Lu, ‘An Initial Assessment of Standards in Technology Tort Litigation’
ABSTRACT Standards are a central preoccupation of AI governance, yet the dominant policy conversation – focused on regulatory compliance and coordination – does not capture how standards actually function in the legal domain most likely to govern AI-related harms: tort law. This Article offers an empirical and doctrinal assessment of standards in technology tort litigation, […]