Rotok, Ends 'Sentence Prediction Service' Following Bar Association Regulation Changes

[Image source=Yonhap News]

[Asia Economy Reporter Kim Hyung-min] The legal service platform 'Lotoc' has decided to discontinue its sentencing prediction service following the amendment of advertising regulations by the Korean Bar Association (KBA).

Lotoc's operator, Law&Company, announced on the 15th, "We will terminate Lotoc's sentencing prediction service on the 30th." They explained, "This decision follows the KBA's amendment of the 'Regulations on Lawyer Advertising' in May and the initiation of disciplinary investigations into lawyers using legal service platforms."

The regulations on lawyer advertising were amended by the KBA to classify legal service platforms as illegal online office manager services and to regulate the use of such platforms by affiliated lawyers. The revised provisions prohibit entrusting promotion or referral of lawyers to non-lawyers.

In particular, it explicitly states that one must not request promotion or introduction from persons who "are not lawyers but handle or provide services that claim to predict the outcomes of investigations, administrative agency dispositions, or court rulings."

Law&Company criticized these provisions, stating that "they are targeting Lotoc's sentencing prediction service," and argued that "they infringe on lawyers' freedom to conduct business and put pressure on the services of legal service platforms."

The sentencing prediction service provided results based on statistical analysis of 470,000 first-instance criminal judgments handed down between 2013 and 2020, with a cumulative usage count reaching 160,000.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.