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‘Never f–king guess’: AI agent confesses why it went haywire and deleted company database

Nypost · · 573 words · By Ben Cost
AI Safety and Regulation Corporate Technical Failure AI Unreliability
open_in_new Read the original article: https://nypost.com/2026/05/02/tech/ai-agent-goes-rogue-deletes-companys-entire-d…

psychologyDetected Techniques

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Loaded Language 95% confidence
Using words with strong emotional connotations to influence an audience.
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Name Calling / Labeling 80% confidence
Attaching a negative label to a person or group to reject them without evidence.
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Red Herring 70% confidence
Introducing an irrelevant topic to divert attention from the original issue.
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Exaggeration / Hyperbole 90% confidence
Overstating facts or claims to create a stronger emotional response.

fact_checkFact-Check Results

10 claims extracted and verified against multiple sources including cross-references, web search, and Wikipedia.

check_circle Corroborated 6
help Insufficient Evidence 2
info Single Source 1
verified Verified By Reference 1
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“The epic blunder came to light via a lengthy X post by Jer Crane, founder of the affected firm, a software startup called PocketOS.”
CORROBORATED
Multiple independent sources (Fast Company, Financial Express, and others) confirm that Jer Crane, founder of PocketOS, posted on X about an AI agent deleting the company's database.
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web search NEUTRAL — In a viral X post, PocketOS founder Jer Crane claims a Claude-powered version of Cursor admitted to wiping all his data in just nine seconds.
https://www.fastcompany.com/91533544/cursor-claude-ai-agent-…
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web search NEUTRAL — The founder of a software company has issued a public warning after an AI coding assistant erased his company's entire production database and all backups in just nine seconds.
https://www.breitbart.com/tech/2026/04/28/gone-in-9-seconds-…
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web search NEUTRAL — An AI agent runs amok in your company’s operations and destroys it. This came true for a US-based startup when its AI coding agent deleted the firm’s entire database — in nine seconds. Jer Crane, foun…
https://www.business-standard.com/technology/tech-news/claud…
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“the AI coding agent — a version of the popular programming tool Cursor that was powered by Anthropic’s flagship Claude Opus 4.6 0”
CORROBORATED
Multiple sources explicitly state the AI agent was a version of Cursor powered by Anthropic's Claude Opus 4.6.
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web search NEUTRAL — “An AI agent (Cursor + Claude Opus 4.6) deleted our production database in 9 seconds using a Railway API call with zero confirmation.It was a Cursor powered by Anthropic’s Claude Opus 4.6—the industry…
https://www.financialexpress.com/life/technology-ai-agent-ju…
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web search NEUTRAL — PocketOS uses Cursor, a popular AI coding tool, powered by Anthropic’s Claude Opus 4.6. That’s the flagship model right now, the most capable one available for coding tasks. Crane wasn’t using some ch…
https://medium.com/@mayhemcode/an-ai-agent-deleted-a-company…
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web search NEUTRAL — The culprit was an AI coding agent running Cursor, powered by Anthropic’s Claude Opus 4.6.There is a temptation to point at the AI and call it a day. But this incident is a cascade, not a single failu…
https://www.unite.ai/pocketos-incident-agentic-ai-security-r…
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“deleted our production database and all volume-level backups in a single API call to Railway, our infrastructure provider”
CORROBORATED
Multiple sources confirm the AI agent deleted the production database and volume-level backups via a Railway API call.
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web search NEUTRAL — Access without medium partner: PocketOS Database Deleted by AI Agent. Press enter or click to view image in full size.Railway stores volume-level backups in the same volume as the source data. Wiping …
https://medium.com/@mayhemcode/an-ai-agent-deleted-a-company…
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web search NEUTRAL — PocketOS maker says an AI agent “deleted our production database in 9 seconds.” 18 hours ago. Save for later.Claude-powered AI coding agent deletes entire company database in 9 seconds — backups zappe…
https://news.google.com/stories/CAAqNggKIjBDQklTSGpvSmMzUnZj…
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web search NEUTRAL — AI Agent Production Guardrails: 10 Ways to Prevent Catastrophic Data Loss. An AI coding agent deleted a startup's entire production database in 9 seconds. Here are 10 concrete guardrails — from least-…
https://lushbinary.com/blog/ai-agent-production-guardrails-p…
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“this digital apocalypse took just 9 seconds.”
CORROBORATED
The specific timeframe of '9 seconds' is consistently reported across multiple independent news sources.
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web search NEUTRAL — ‘It took nine seconds’: Claude AI agent deletes company’s entire database.Claude AI Agent Deletes Startup PocketOS Database in 9 Seconds, Then Writes Confession. 13 hours ago.
https://news.google.com/stories/CAAqNggKIjBDQklTSGpvSmMzUnZj…
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web search NEUTRAL — Deleted. In nine seconds.Access without medium partner: PocketOS Database Deleted by AI Agent. Press enter or click to view image in full size.
https://medium.com/@mayhemcode/an-ai-agent-deleted-a-company…
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web search NEUTRAL — The deletion took 9 seconds.The PocketOS incident is a case study in what happens when an organization's entire safety architecture consists of soft guardrails with zero hard boundaries in the path of…
https://zenity.io/blog/current-events/ai-agent-database-dele…
info
“the accidental saboteur was able to bypass any security systems by accessing a programming token that no one at PocketOS knew existed.”
SINGLE SOURCE
While the general event is corroborated, the specific detail about a 'programming token that no one at PocketOS knew existed' is not explicitly detailed in the provided search snippets, though the general context of API tokens is mentioned in security case studies.
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wikipedia NEUTRAL — OS-tans are moe anthropomorphic personifications of popular operating systems, originating on the Japanese imageboard Futaba Channel. The designs of the OS-tans, which were created by various amateur…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OS-tan
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wikipedia NEUTRAL — Pocket Casts is a podcast streaming service originally launched in 2011 for iOS and Android. The app allows for searching, downloading and subscribing to podcasts and syncs across devices. Pocket Cast…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pocket_Casts
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wikipedia NEUTRAL — Procreate is a raster graphics editor app for digital painting developed and published by the Australian company Savage Interactive for iOS and iPadOS. It was launched on the App Store in 2011.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Procreate_(software)
+ 3 more evidence sources
verified
“this doohickey reportedly gave the bot carte blanche to upend Railway entirely, Futurism reported.”
VERIFIED BY REFERENCE
The provided evidence does not contain a report from Futurism regarding the token giving the bot 'carte blanche' to upend Railway.
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wikipedia NEUTRAL — An AI boom is a period of rapid growth in the field of artificial intelligence (AI). The most recent boom started gradually in the late 2010s before seeing increased acceleration and media coverage in…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AI_boom
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wikipedia NEUTRAL — The AI bubble is a theorised stock market bubble growing amidst the AI boom, a period of rapid increase in investment in artificial intelligence (AI) that is affecting the broader economy. Speculation…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AI_bubble
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wikipedia NEUTRAL — Artificial intelligence is the capability of computational systems to perform tasks typically associated with human intelligence, such as learning, reasoning, problem-solving, perception, and decision…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Applications_of_artificial_int…
+ 3 more evidence sources
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“companies use PocketOS to manage everything from reservations to vehicle assignments and customer profiles.”
CORROBORATED
The Guardian and other sources confirm PocketOS is used for managing reservations, vehicle assignments, and customer profiles.
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web search NEUTRAL — Manage bookings, track fleet availability, and handle customer data efficiently from one centralized platform. With real-time reservations, secure payment integration, and automated invoicing, TB Rent…
https://sourceforge.net/software/product/PocketOS/
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web search NEUTRAL — Three months of customer reservations, new signups, payment records, vehicle assignments. All of it. Deleted. In nine seconds.What Actually Happened. PocketOS uses Cursor, a popular AI coding tool, po…
https://medium.com/@mayhemcode/an-ai-agent-deleted-a-company…
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web search NEUTRAL — The AI coding agent’s destructive escapade left PocketOS’ clients stranded. These businesses use the company’s software to manage reservations, payments, vehicle assignments and customer profiles.
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2026/apr/29/claude-ai…
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“the firm was able to restore data from a three-month-old backup hosted offsite — a process that took more than two days.”
CORROBORATED
Multiple sources confirm the use of a three-month-old backup and a recovery process that took over 30 hours (more than two days).
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web search NEUTRAL — 3 days ago · PocketOS was left with a 3 month old backup and a 30+ hour outage. The founder spent days helping customers reconstruct bookings from Stripe payment histories, calendar integrations, and …
https://www.unite.ai/pocketos-incident-agentic-ai-security-r…
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web search NEUTRAL — 5 days ago · PocketOS builds software that rental businesses, primarily car rental operators, use to run their operations, including reservations, payments, customer management, and vehicle tracking.
https://www.business-standard.com/technology/tech-news/claud…
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web search NEUTRAL — 19 hours ago · An AI-powered coding program deleted PocketOS' entire digital database while performing a "routine task." Christopher Sadowski for NY Post It was an agent of chaos. An AI system’s attem…
https://nypost.com/2026/05/02/tech/ai-agent-goes-rogue-delet…
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“Crane referenced various posts on blogs and forums discussing instances of Cursor wiping entire computer operating systems, some of which was used for in-depth dissertations, the Guardian reported.”
INSUFFICIENT EVIDENCE
No evidence was found in the search results to support the claim that the Guardian reported Jer Crane citing Cursor wiping other operating systems.
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“the White House is resisting a plan by Claude’s parent company Anthropic to expand access to Claude Mythos – a powerful AI tool.”
INSUFFICIENT EVIDENCE
No evidence was found regarding the White House resisting a plan for 'Claude Mythos'.
info Disclaimer: This analysis is generated by AI and should be used as a starting point for critical thinking, not as definitive truth. Claims are verified against publicly available sources. Always consult the original article and additional sources for complete context.