How to Track and Follow Court Standing Orders on AI Disclosure

Why are AI standing orders hard to track?

AI standing orders are hard to track because each court, and often each judge, writes its own. A single litigation docket can involve a statute, a district's local rules, a court-wide general order, an individual judge's standing order and a case management order, each with its own trigger and its own wording. Missing one can carry consequences: some orders, including the Eastern District of Texas order below, provide for sanctions.

Two federal examples show the range. In the Eastern District of Texas, Local Rule AT-3(m) tells lawyers to review and verify AI-generated content, and a standing order signed April 9, 2025 in the Tyler Division goes further: every filing must carry a "Certificate of Generative Artificial Intelligence Usage" stating whether AI was used, naming the tool, explaining how it was used and certifying that the filer checked facts, citations and legal authority. A filing without the certificate is presumed to contain no AI-prepared content. Closer to home, the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of California issued General Order 210, effective January 1, 2026, covering all pleadings, motions and papers. Its companion Form CSD 5013 asks the filer to identify each generative AI program used and certify the paper was checked "for factual and legal accuracy" using print reporters, traditional legal databases or other reliable means outside of AI.

Both orders sit on top of the duty every federal filer already has under Fed. R. Civ. P. 11(b)(2): legal contentions must be warranted by existing law. A standing order changes what you must disclose. It does not change who is responsible for the content.

What changes for California attorneys on January 1, 2027?

Starting January 1, 2027, California attorneys must disclose generative AI use to the court and personally verify every citation in a filed paper. SB 574, signed September 30, 2026, adds Business and Professions Code section 6068.1, which requires attorneys to disclose the use of generative AI to the court for all documents submitted. It also amends Code of Civil Procedure section 128.7 so that a filed paper may not contain citations the responsible attorney has not personally verified, including citations a generative AI tool supplied, and makes the law firm jointly responsible for violations by its partners, associates and employees absent exceptional circumstances. Our guide to Opinion 512 and SB 574 covers the statute's other duties.

The statute does not prescribe the form of the disclosure. Where a judge has specified a declaration, a certificate or a particular form, that is the format the court expects. Firms with federal matters should ask counsel whether the SB 574 duty also reaches federal filings, and meet each federal judge's own requirements either way.

One source of confusion is California Rules of Court, rule 10.430. It took effect September 1, 2025 and required each California court that allows generative AI to adopt a use policy by December 15, 2025. That rule governs court staff and judicial officers and places no duties on attorneys or the papers they file, so record it in your tracker as background only.

Where do AI disclosure requirements actually appear?

AI disclosure requirements for court filings appear in at least five places, and a tracker has to check all of them for every matter:

• State statutes and rules of professional conduct, such as SB 574 in California.
• District or court local rules, such as Eastern District of Texas Local Rule AT-3(m).
• Court-wide general orders and required forms, such as General Order 210 and Form CSD 5013.
• An individual judge's standing order or posted procedures, which can differ between judges in the same courthouse.
• Case-specific orders: scheduling orders, case management orders and protective orders that address AI tools or the handling of discovery material.

Ethics guidance such as ABA Formal Opinion 512 also discusses candor to the tribunal and notes that lawyers must comply with applicable court rules on AI. It does not replace the court's own requirements.

How do you build an AI standing order tracker?

Build it from your active matters. The goal is a record, per judge, of what a filing in front of that judge needs, with a source and a date you can show if anyone asks.

1. Export every active litigation matter with its court, division, assigned district judge and magistrate judge. Add bankruptcy and appellate matters.
2. Name an owner for the tracker, usually the person who already maintains local rules and judges' procedures, with an attorney who approves disclosure language.
3. For each court and judge, check the court's general orders page, the local rules page, the judge's procedures or standing orders page, and the docket of each case for case-specific orders.
4. Record each requirement in fixed fields: what triggers it (any AI use or only drafting), what must be disclosed (tool name, how it was used), the certification wording, the required form or placement, effective date, source URL and date last checked.
5. Save a PDF copy of each order as it read on the day you checked it, so the record survives a later amendment.
6. Re-check when a case is reassigned, when a new judge is added, when a court announces a new general order, and on a set schedule, such as monthly.
7. Wire the result into the pre-filing checklist, so the person finalizing a filing sees the judge's AI requirement next to the page limits and formatting rules.

How do you know what to disclose if you do not know which tools were used?

You need a record of AI use per matter, because a certificate is only as accurate as the firm's knowledge of what touched the document. If attorneys can use personal AI accounts on firm devices, nobody can say with confidence which tool drafted a paragraph or supplied a citation.

The practical controls are familiar ones. Give attorneys approved AI tools under firm accounts, block personal AI sign-ins on firm devices, retain prompts and responses where your platform supports it, and keep a cite-check log with each filing showing who verified each authority. Together these let the responsible attorney answer the two questions these orders ask: which tool was used, and how was the output checked.

What should you do this quarter?

With SB 574 operative January 1, 2027, the next two months are the window to get the process in place before it applies to every California filing.

• Build the tracker for your current docket and assign its owner.
• Have counsel approve standard disclosure language for SB 574 and a set of variants matching the federal orders your attorneys see most.
• Add an AI disclosure line to the pre-filing checklist and the cite-check log.
• Confirm your AI platform policy is enforced: approved tools only, personal accounts blocked, prompts retained.
• Brief attorneys, paralegals and docketing staff on where the requirements live and who to ask.

How s90 helps

s90 does not interpret court orders; that stays with your attorneys. What we provide is the technical side: enforcing your AI platform policy, monitoring prompts on approved tools and keeping the records that show which AI tools were used on a matter. If you want help putting those controls in place before January, we are happy to talk it through.