This article focuses on the highlights of the webinar, including the main challenges in future tech disputes, the impact of post-pandemic digitisation and deep dives into key evolving areas of IT disputes.

Watch the full Solomonic webinar, featuring speakers Rebecca Keating (Barrister, 4 Pump Court), Lauren Hamilton (Partner, Addleshaw Goddard), Grant McCaig (Head of Legal, Phoenix Group) and Domonique Rai-Varming (VP of Trust and Legal at TrustPilot) here: Tech disputes uncovered on-demand webinar — Solomonic.

Top litigation trends

Solomonic’s analysis of litigation trends of over 160 tech-sector parties reveals key insights into claim types and volumes, sector dynamics, and settlement tendencies. While more detailed information is available in the webinar, the top tech dispute trends in the industry include the following:

• TMT providers have seen a steady increase in litigation claims since 2020/21. 
• TMT parties are more likely to have claims brought against them than to bring a claim, and such disputes are more likely to proceed to trial than other sectors[1]
• Companies in highly regulated industries such as consumer products, banking and finance tend to comprise the more common opposing parties
• Public sector disputes also feature within the top three sectors of TMT advanced claims.
• The most common claim type, based on a review of claim specific data, is contractual dispute.

The expert’s perspective

Steadily increasing tech dispute claim volumes were expected in the aftermath of the global pandemic. As companies and organisations scrambled to digitise during the pandemic, many were unprepared to form a digital roadmap and rapidly implement it, Steadily increasing tech dispute claim volumes were expected in the aftermath of the global pandemic. As companies and organisations scrambled to digitise during the pandemic, many were unprepared to form a digital roadmap and rapidly implement it. This led to an increase in technology disputes in recent years, particularly among those lacking in technological experience, be it in usage or implementation.

IT contract disputes

As Solomonic’s data highlights, contractual disputes are the highest-ranking technology dispute “type.” Technology contracts are often very complex, particularly those involving third-party supply chain and outsourced components. 

There are many common areas within IT contracts alone where contentious issues can arise. Below, we expand on some of the more common disputed areas: 

• Requirements traceability, scope creep, change and governance

Common IT contract dispute themes that persist despite a TMT vendor or client’s experience often relate to the requirements of the system or product.

• Requirements elicitation is a key component of any system design or implementation and yet organisations often struggle to realise what they actually want, versus what is actually needed and/or what will be adopted by the wider team. Disputes tend to arise around whether a vendor has sufficiently delivered what the client wanted. In cases where delivery is contractually agreed, internal adoption issues still arise in relation to new technology processes.
• Assessing a product or system’s fitness for purpose centres on the identification of captured requirements and their traceability. Requirements gathering is arguably stage one of the implementation lifecycle and yet, one of the most common areas of dispute, lending itself to further contention around originally identified scope versus change.
• Another common dispute area within IT contracts pertains to governance, particularly where contracts have subcontracted or multiparty components. Keeping track of project risks, issues, and dependencies is crucial to managing the contract effectively. Often these obligations face time constraints due to organisational business-as-usual activities and the subsequent neglect resulting in dispute. Although no party wants to start an engagement with dispute in mind, preserving accurate records of requirements and priorities, perhaps under a MoSCoW[2] framework, will be beneficial for any retrospective analysis needed to be undertaken by an expert.

• Testing, performance, and misrepresentation

Whilst the areas of contention above usually relate to live projects, post completion implementation disputes often arise in relation to a product or system’s performance. Whether a system “fails” due to an obvious degradation in performance, or just by not meeting the agreed service levels (SLAs) in the contract, parties may end up in dispute or face a warranty claim. The expert’s role in this case is to identify whether the product or system was originally agreed upon and/or capable of performing as stated. Often this analysis goes back to the requirements stage and identifies that either capabilities were misstated or misunderstood, and insufficient product and platform testing was performed.

• Delay

Technology contracts can be complex and of extremely high value. Such complexity often breeds delay, particularly where roles and responsibilities and/or project dependencies are not properly managed. With appropriate input, delays can often be mitigated and remediated once the root cause event is identified. With any delayed project, whether it be transformation or migration and transition, it is important for parties to stay focused on the original end goal. Technology dispute experts can be pivotal in alternate dispute resolution (ADR) by getting parties back on track and avoiding costly litigation.

Challenges in future tech disputes (involving modernised tech) 

As discussed in the webinar, several critical challenges will arise in future technology disputes, chief among them: 

• Data

Post-pandemic digitisation efforts have resulted in more digital data processing across industries and sectors, and that increased tech adoption has led to data and technology issues where the heart of the claim may not be strictly defined as a TMT sector dispute. With further adoption of AI expected across companies and organisations, vast amounts of data will have to be consumed to interrogate and litigate alleged system breaches, infringements, and malfunctions.

Technical experts in particular may be faced with a raft of evidentiary material (e.g., considering the training data of AI models), which will be unmanageable without using further smart tooling such as AI-based review tools. Using AI to investigate AI will quite likely become the norm, even though it may sound counterintuitive.  

• Skills

Finding the right court expert in advanced or evolving tech fields will remain a key challenge in tech disputes. The “black box”[3] nature of complex AI systems will likely result in cases where the expert evidence is somewhat ambiguous, until AI deployments can be subject to standardised auditing and inspection.

• Court readiness

Technology disputes can be a minefield of complex terms and acronyms for courts, notwithstanding specialised UK establishments such as the Technology and Construction Court (TCC). The adoption of advanced technology such as agentic AI and quantum computing mean that judges will be required to undertake more complex reading.

Until AI focused disputes and other technologically complex matters become more frequent within litigations, it may be difficult for judges or arbitrators to understand the exact technological facets of the case without further training. A potential solution is to have an independent expert at hand to assist the judge with specific technological aspects of the case.

• Cross-border issues

• Disclosure 
  • Supply chain disputes (for example between EU and UK service lines) arising from EU legislation non-compliance such as the Digital Operations Resilience Act (DORA) and other approaching legislation will likely add complexity to technology disputes. 
  • Dispute specialists will be faced with an abundance of data, necessary to interrogate and litigate systems, particularly system breaches and malfunctions. Data collection and processing complexities will be exacerbated by the need to collect bigger data sets for evidentiary purposes (for example, interwoven agentic AI components requiring capture of decision points). At the same time, they may be constrained by narrower disclosure obligations and settings.
• Best practice
  • Experts are often tasked within disputes to provide their opinion on or to explain what the “norm” would be in a particular industry setting. This typically arises from an absence of clear performance and contractual profiles that might enable more factual diagnoses. In cross-border disputes, differing legislative or regulatory requirements may push more focus on best practice considerations. Challenges may therefore arise in relation to expert opinion divergence on best practice, unless agreement can be reached by parties in advance that a unified standard (such as ISO/IEC) will be used as a benchmark. 

• Costs

The more data and complexity within a claim, the higher the potential costs. Although advanced AI capability in eDiscovery tooling may reduce review costs, other trial costs may increase simultaneously. Technology dispute expert witnesses will  need to be even more specialised, in newer and more complex technologies, and it is likely that multiple experts will be required per claim to assist the court, increasing costs even further.  

What the future holds

The Solomonic webinar panel discussed key insights on technology dispute trends going forward. Here is a brief recap of some of the predictions, as well as some additional considerations based on A&M’s observations.   

AI claims

AI-based disputes vary in nature. Claims have arisen already regarding misrepresentation in relation to the performance of graphic processing unit (GPU) component capabilities for AI training, and other more well-known copyright and  patent cases. 

From 2026 onwards, it is likely that IT contract claims will increase as more AI services are provided, and agentic AI components are woven into traditional IT transformation/migration project lifecycles. The EU’s Product Liability Directive (PLD)   (defining software as a product) may give rise to further action (potentially increasing group actions) where defects are alleged to have caused harm on a wider, more public scale.

In-house risks

With a plethora of AI tools available for business use, organisational adoption should be carefully monitored. Internal IT teams should be made aware of the issues surrounding usage, particularly from a legal perspective.  As an organisation’s costs around technology modernisation and compliance increase, IT professionals may be inclined to use AI tools as a shortcut in processes, such as generating functional software code from natural language prompts. These tools make app building more accessible, especially for those with limited programming skills, accelerating development to a functioning program within minutes.

Internal staff run the risk of using AI-generated code without fully comprehending its functionality. This can have severe consequences such as undetected bugs, errors and defects, as well as security vulnerabilities.  Where IT staff have created their own functionality, organisations have no recourse to financial recompense from say, an external contractor, for issues arising from poor code, be it a data breach or system failure. Organisation compliance and legal teams would benefit from being aware of tools that might be deployed internally by staff and being mindful of cost-cutting intentions. 

Legislation and regulation

Digital regulation as a whole converges on three major principles:

• Transparency: Organisations must be able to show how data was processed, and decisions were made.
• Auditability: Decision systems must generate records that are traceable, accessible, and tamper-proof.
• Access rights: Counterparties, regulators, and courts may demand disclosure of system behaviour, logs, and data lineage.

Legislation and regulatory changes will therefore factor highly in future technology disputes. 

The UK Procurement Act 2023 marks a major change in the way businesses manage digital data and technology procurements. It aims to make procurement quicker and more flexible, transparent and accessible to SMEs and new entrants, along with more commercial-style thinking. Under the Procurement Act, tech vendors and contracting authorities need to act strategically to avoid dispute. This means defining clear technical specifications and data rights from the outset, ensuring staff have the training, resources, and digital skills needed to avoid potential dispute.

Beyond the UK (but potentially impacting UK organisations through supply chain failures), we could see an increase in EU driven cyber-related disputes pertaining to non-conformance with acts such as NIS2, DORA, the Cyber Resilience Act (CRA), and other mandatory regulations. 

Evolution of evidence 

As disputes become more complex and data driven, organisations should consider key evidentiary aspects of technology disputes:

• Reliability of computer evidence 

  On 21st January 2025, The UK government launched a Call for Evidence on Use of Evidence Generated by Software in Criminal Proceedings[4], contributed by the high-profile group action of Bates & Others v Post Office Limited[5].The call for evidence follows recognition that the common law presumption that, “the computer was operating correctly unless there is evidence to the contrary” may no longer be fit for purpose in a world of increasingly complex software, AI, and interconnected systems.

  Key concerns about the reliability of computer evidence include the longstanding presumption that systems function correctly, which critics argue unfairly benefits those relying on faulty software. This raises questions about where the burden of proof should lie, with proposals suggesting that parties introducing computer evidence should demonstrate its reliability through testing and validation. Access to system logs, error reports, and audit trails is often limited, making it difficult to uncover flaws, while courts themselves may lack the technical expertise to scrutinise complex software or expert testimony effectively. Broader issues include the need for clear standards on validation, transparency, and disclosure, particularly for proprietary or AI-driven systems, since modern, opaque technologies create new risks around bias, reproducibility, and interpretability.

• Synthetic evidence 

  Compounding these risks is the growing prevalence of deepfakes and synthetic media, creating significant challenges in evidentiary settings. Courts and arbitral tribunals will increasingly grapple with the admissibility and authenticity of digital evidence, with disputes arising over whether content has been manipulated or fabricated. This is likely to prompt litigation around chain-of-custody protocols, forensic verification obligations, and vendor liability where technologies fail to detect or prevent malicious use of synthetic media.

• Explainable AI (XAI)

  Explainable AI (XAI) refers to the development and deployment of AI systems in a way that makes their functioning, decision-making processes, and outcomes understandable to human users. Unlike “black box” models that generate results without transparency, XAI seeks to enhance accountability, fairness, and trust by providing clear explanations of how inputs lead to outputs. This not only supports regulatory compliance and ethical standards but also improves user confidence, facilitates oversight, and helps organisations identify and mitigate risks such as bias, error, or unintended consequences in automated decision-making.

  For transactional lawyers, XAI introduces important considerations in drafting contracts for organisations that procure, deploy, or license AI systems. Lawyers should negotiate provisions that require vendors to disclose the logic, methodology, and data sources underpinning their AI tools, alongside obligations to maintain auditability, enable human review, and comply with applicable regulatory requirements. Contracts should also address warranties regarding system performance, bias mitigation, and explainability features, while securing rights for organisations to access explanations, conduct independent testing, and enforce remedies if AI outputs cause harm or fail to meet agreed standards. Embedding these requirements into contracts helps organisations align with emerging legal frameworks, manage operational risks, and ensure that AI systems operate in line with principles of transparency and accountability.

Alternate dispute resolution

Traditional litigation may struggle to keep pace with the technical depth and rapid evolution of AI technologies. ADR methods such as arbitration and mediation, by contrast, offer greater flexibility, expertise-driven decision-making, and the ability to preserve business relationships while maintaining privacy. As AI systems become more integral to critical decisions and their inner workings remain difficult to interpret, the need for specialised, efficient, and adaptable resolution processes may likely drive a notable rise in the preference for ADR over conventional court proceedings.

Conclusion

Overall, as organisations become more reliant on artificial intelligence, data-driven systems, and complex digital infrastructure, the nature of technology-related disputes is set to shift in scope, complexity and intensity in 2026.

It is likely that technology disputes will feature more prominently outside of the TMT sector specifically, due to organisational dependencies and AI innovation. Contractual disagreements over vendor liability, AI performance, bias, transparency, and explainability will be at the heart of future disputes.

Key technology areas primed for growth include cybersecurity and data privacy, particularly as breaches and misuse of data continue to escalate alongside stricter regulatory regimes. Also, intellectual property (IP) considerations particularly relating to generative AI, the ownership of AI output, and training data, are likely to surge as components become woven into the more traditional IT implementations / service transitions.

As technology advances in complexity, cost and knowledge, challenges and constraints applied to future technology disputes could impact dispute resolution, potentially creating more claims. Paradoxically, it could also prompt them to settle, resulting in a rise of ADR alongside litigation disputes.  Overall, we expect dispute resolution specialists to be busier than ever.