This is part 1 of a two-part series exploring how artificial intelligence is impacting so-called “claims instigation” in commercial auto. Part 2 will discuss the challenges in keeping pace with AI-enabled litigation.
Artificial intelligence is rapidly changing how injured motorists find legal representation after a truck accident, creating new challenges for commercial auto insurers already grappling with social inflation and nuclear verdicts.
Research from ratings agency Demotech and the digital risk firm 4WARN — two organizations whose work on the issue is jointly produced — argues that the combination of generative AI, sophisticated search engine optimization (SEO), paid online advertising and litigation funding is transforming what was once largely traditional legal marketing into a highly scalable digital ecosystem designed to intercept claimants before insurers or fleet operators can engage with them.
The issue has emerged as commercial auto insurers continue to struggle with profitability. According to the Insurance Information Institute (Triple-I), commercial auto has been one of the property/casualty industry's least profitable major lines for years, with rising claims severity driven by inflation, higher repair costs and increasingly expensive litigation.
Against that backdrop, AI is adding another dimension.
The issue first came to Demotech's attention while investigating the collapse of several Florida property insurers in 2021 and 2022, all of which it had rated.
According to Petrelli, the carriers had received clean independent audits and actuarial opinions until the year they failed, and the company's review concluded that litigation had accelerated faster than auditors or actuaries flagged. "When I saw these companies simply fall off a cliff – we're talking clean opinions, clean audits, good balance sheets, good financial statements right up until the day they failed – I looked at that and thought, 'We're better than this,’” said Petrelli.
Demotech's ratings have themselves drawn scrutiny: a Wall Street Journal analysis and a 2025 Senate inquiry have noted that its rated insurers failed at far higher rates than those graded by larger agencies. Petrelli attributes the failures to a litigation surge his firm could not have anticipated.
Petrelli brought in data scientist Todd Kozikowski (pictured on the left) to investigate whether something beyond traditional litigation trends was occurring. Kozikowski went on to co-found 4WARN, which now markets the firm's findings as a service; Petrelli and Demotech remain closely associated with the research.
Their joint work concluded that online targeting campaigns extended well beyond Florida's property insurance market and were also heavily focused on transportation companies and commercial trucking.
"Commercial trucking is the second-most targeted industry after insurance," said Petrelli. "The reason is simple: trucking has mandatory insurance limits. When a plaintiff attorney sees an 18-wheeler, they don't see a truck – they see a $2 million insurance policy."
Kozikowski, who leads 4WARN, believes the industry's attention has focused too narrowly on AI-generated fraud while overlooking how generative AI is reshaping internet search itself.
"Most of the industry has been focused on AI, specifically generative AI, in relation to doctored images, synthetic media, and deepfakes," Kozikowski said. "Where 4WARN comes in is looking at how the internet itself can be exploited and manipulated, specifically search."
According to Kozikowski, three areas have become particularly vulnerable. The first is paid search advertising, where sponsored results appear above organic search listings. The second involves AI-generated search summaries that increasingly synthesize information from multiple online sources. The third is traditional organic search rankings, which can still be manipulated through search-engine optimization tactics.
"What we see are opportunists coordinating bids on those ads and controlling ad flow," Kozikowski said. "They're creating exploitative ads, misdirection in some cases, and coordinating bidding strategies to mislead and capture consumers."
Even more concerning, he said, is AI's ability to amplify misinformation. "We're uncovering cases where opportunists inject content, introduce false narratives, and spread misinformation. That changes search rankings and even changes the citations AI systems use in their answers. You can imagine what that means for redirecting policyholders into different intake funnels based on search results."
The scale 4WARN describes is substantial, though the underlying figures come from the firm's own proprietary analysis and have not been independently verified.
By 4WARN's count, an analysis of 56 plaintiff law firms targeting transportation-related claims found they collectively spent more than $228 million annually on paid search advertising. The firm says around 88% of those firms were actively investing in paid search campaigns, and that paid traffic generated nearly twice as many website visits as organic search.
Kozikowski said the economics demonstrate how valuable these online leads have become. "If you search something like 'truck accident attorney' and add a city – for example, 'Orlando truck accident attorney' – you'll find that clicks can cost hundreds of dollars. In Santa Ana it's approaching $1,000 per click. That doesn't necessarily mean every click turns into a claim or lawsuit, but they're paying enormous sums just to get traffic to convert."
His team analyzes what 4WARN describes as roughly three-quarters of a billion data points from search engines, advertising platforms and other online sources to identify "digital breadcrumbs" linking advertisers, marketers, litigation funders and referral networks.
The broader litigation trend is corroborated by legal analytics firm Lex Machina, which has reported a steady rise in insurance-related litigation in federal court in recent years.
Mark Gallagher, who leads the national transportation practice at Risk Placement Services, has noted that underwriters have tightened expectations around claims reporting, with many insurers now emphasizing same-day notification directly to the carrier.
Prompt reporting lets an insurer investigate quickly, document the scene and interview witnesses, potentially blunting the impact of social inflation, litigation funding and nuclear verdicts. "Late reported claims have the potential of introducing issues that have been exacerbated over the last few years," Gallagher told Insurance Business.
Petrelli believes the technology has evolved beyond the point where it can be addressed solely through traditional insurance regulation. He warned that if the trend continues unchecked, the consequences could extend beyond insurers to the broader economy.
"Many of these attacks originate outside the United States," he said. "That means there's no single regulator overseeing the problem.”
Meanwhile, at least one defense attorney has warned that the technology gap is widening between the two sides of the bar. Ashley Fetyko, a senior partner at insurance defense firm Tyson & Mendes, said the plaintiffs' bar has consistently been quicker to adopt new tools, and that AI has stretched the lead.
"The plaintiffs' bar tends to be much more agile in adapting to new tools, new environments, and even new arguments and approaches," Fetyko said. "On the flip side, the defense, particularly insurance defense, is very slow to change."
She said plaintiff firms are using AI not only to identify potential clients but to flag which cases are most likely to produce nuclear verdicts, then concentrate resources on them. The contingency model, she noted, drives the behavior: firms collecting a large share of any award are "highly motivated to pursue nuclear verdicts and make excellent use of new technology to achieve that."
For Fetyko, the defense's slower uptake is largely self-inflicted, because the same tools are available to both sides. "If the plaintiffs' bar knows which cases are likely to go nuclear, why doesn't the defense?” she said. “The technology certainly exists. The defense simply isn't making full use of it."
Whether the defense can close that gap, and what could lie ahead for the insurance industry, is the subject of Part 2.
