OpenAI’s Astra for Law combines GPT-6 Astra with specialized legal research, firm-specific tools and additional privacy controls to bring frontier AI into professional legal workflows. (Source: Image by RR)

Selected Law Firms Gain Early Access through Trusted Access Program

OpenAI is moving deeper into professional legal services with Astra for Law, a specialized version of its GPT-6 Astra model designed for law firms and legal technology companies. The system, according to a story on openai.com, combines OpenAI’s most powerful model with legal-specific instructions, tools and context, including a new search index covering U.S. case law, statutes, regulations, court rules and administrative decisions across more than 230 million URLs. OpenAI says the system will initially be available to selected law firms through Trusted Access in ChatGPT and Codex, with an API version planned for legal technology companies including Harvey and Legora.

OpenAI says the specialized configuration significantly improves Astra’s legal research performance compared with the general model using ordinary web search. On 200 questions from a private validation set of Vals AI’s Legal Research Bench, Astra for Law passed the benchmark’s overall correctness check on 54 percent of questions at its highest reasoning setting, compared with 38.7 percent for GPT-6 Astra using web search alone—a 40 percent relative improvement. On case-law questions, the legal version found 24 percent more reference cases and retrieved up to 54 percent more relevant passages from the correct opinions at equivalent reasoning levels.

The system is also intended to move beyond research into broader legal workflows, applying authorities to client facts, developing arguments and deal terms, identifying weaknesses and distinguishing binding holdings from less authoritative judicial observations. OpenAI says law firms can customize the technology around their own precedents and methods: Sullivan & Cromwell has built an agreement analyzer, Ropes & Gray created a deal-diligence system and Cooley developed a tool that assists companies preparing IPO filings. Twenty-six new legal plugins also connect ChatGPT with specialist platforms including Relativity, Clio, iManage, Intapp and Thomson Reuters products.

Because legal work involves confidential and potentially privileged information, OpenAI is pairing the new system with additional privacy and governance controls. Eligible firms can receive Zero Data Retention through the API, while ChatGPT Enterprise usage is excluded from human review by default. OpenAI is also working with Latham & Watkins on information permissions, ethical walls, client instructions and firm oversight. The launch reflects a broader evolution in enterprise AI: rather than asking one general-purpose chatbot to perform every professional task, AI companies are increasingly combining frontier models with specialized data, tools and institutional safeguards designed around individual industries.

read more at openai.com