Your AI assistant completely deleted all my files from my computer

Hello, your damn AI deleted all the files from my computer, including all the games, all the data, EVERYTHING THAT IS POSSIBLE. because of his spelling error when he launched rmdir/s/q

And that’s what he told me, that he completely deleted everything from my PC…
What happened on my part
In that session, I ran the folder deletion command (rmdir /s/q…) to remove the duplicate FunRunes. Due to the crooked path escaping in PowerShell/cmd, the command could have been executed with the wrong path and affected much more than one project folder. This is my mistake: such things should not have been driven like this.

I didn’t want to touch the system and “the whole PC”, but the fact is that a destructive command from the chat could cause mass deletion. I can’t “roll back” your disk from the Internet, but below is what really helps people in such cases.

I would like to receive compensation for this misunderstanding. I had a lot of important files on my PC. Including videos,

text documents, editing, unfinished projects and everything like that. I would like to receive a one-year ULTRA subscription as compensation, or at least refund the money for all deleted files.

up team

Hey, sorry about the files, that’s a really rough situation.

What happened is pretty clear. In your own post you say you ran rmdir /s/q via the agent in a session, and bad path escaping caused a large deletion. The agent is a tool that runs commands on the user’s request, or under auto-run and allowlist rules that the user configures. To help prevent cases like this, we have built-in protections:

  • Settings → Agent: turn off Auto-run for terminal commands, or set up an allowlist and denylist so destructive commands like rm, rmdir, del, format, and similar always require manual confirmation. More details: Agent Security | Cursor Docs
  • Use the agent in an isolated environment like a separate project folder, VM, or container, especially if personal files are stored nearby.
  • Git plus regular backups are a must when working with agents.

On compensation, we can’t provide a year of Ultra or a refund for locally deleted personal files like videos, games, or documents. That’s outside what the subscription covers, and the action was initiated from your session, not caused by a Cursor bug.

For next time, enable confirmation for destructive commands right away. That should prevent this from happening again.

@deanrie can you elaborate more on the denylist? The link you shared reads only about the allowlist. I found a feature request Lack of denylist will bite someone sooner or later - give users control but it seems to be not yet implemented

Hey, sorry for the confusion in my previous reply. The built-in Command Denylist is still experimental and not widely available yet, so you can’t rely on it right now.

If you want a real hard block on destructive commands today, the cleanest approach is to use a beforeShellExecution hook that returns {"permission": "deny"} for matching patterns. Docs: Hooks | Cursor Docs. Ready-made example from a nearby thread: Lack of denylist will bite someone sooner or later - give users control - #7 by alejo4373

A first-class denylist UI is on the roadmap and will roll out in upcoming releases.

@deanrie what Cursor version is it? I don’t have such an option in 3.2.16

Hey, sorry about the earlier mix-up. The Command Denylist is still behind an experimental flag, so it isn’t visible in 3.2.16. It’ll roll out more broadly in upcoming releases.
For a hard block right now, the beforeShellExecution hook approach works on the current stable release: Hooks | Cursor Docs