Houston Harbaugh Attorneys Explore the Ethical and Legal Challenges of AI in For The Defense Magazine

Director R. Brandon McCullough and Law Clerk Taylor C. Hinds were recently published in For the Defense Magazine for their article Artificial Intelligence in Insurance: Risks, Rewards, & Regulations. This article explores how artificial intelligence (AI) is transforming the insurance industry, particularly in areas such as underwriting, claims processing, fraud detection, and customer service, while also highlighting the risks like bias, discrimination, and lack of transparency that AI systems can introduce. It discusses the regulatory responses to these risks, focusing on guidelines such as the NAIC Model Bulletin and state-level legislation in Colorado, California, and New York that aim to ensure ethical and lawful AI use. The authors capture the need for insurers to adopt robust governance frameworks to manage AI responsibly and protect consumers from potential harm.

R. Brandon McCullough is a Director at Houston Harbaugh, P.C. in, where he concentrates his practice primarily in the areas of insurance coverage and bad faith litigation, and complex commercial and business litigation. He represents international and domestic insurance companies in a wide array of coverage disputes in trial courts and on appeal in both state and federal courts. He has litigated and counseled insurers on issues involving numerous types of commercial and personal lines insurance policies, including commercial general liability, excess and umbrella liability, first-party property, builders’ risk, healthcare liability, directors and officers liability, environmental liability, auto liability, trucking liability, homeowners insurance, life insurance, and other specialty insurance products. Brandon’s coverage matters have included disputes over coverage for construction defects, environmental contamination, fires, explosions, equipment failures, latent and progressive injuries, sexual abuse claims, trucking accidents, and natural disasters. He also regularly represents insurers in high-exposure bad faith claims and has litigated and handled appeals in several of the most significant bad faith cases in Pennsylvania history. Brandon’s coverage practice also includes regularly providing insurance coverage opinions and advice to insurers throughout the claims handling process.

Taylor Hinds is a Law Clerk at Houston Harbaugh, P.C. and graduated from the University of Pittsburgh School of Law, in May 2025. She served as a Teaching Assistant for Legal Writing and has held leadership roles as President of the Sports and Entertainment Law Society and Community Liaison for the Pitt Law Women’s Association. Taylor earned her B.A. in Legal Studies from the University of Pittsburgh in 2022, graduating magna cum laude with a minor in Political Science and a certificate in Sport Studies.

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