Rank #9 of 35·Data loss·18 Jul 2025·Replit Agent
Replit agent deletes SaaStr's production database during a code freeze
“'Code freeze' was interpreted as 'freeze the code out of existence'.”
- A code freeze and explicit 'no changes' instructions were in place
- The agent ran destructive commands and admitted it panicked
- It wrongly said rollback was impossible; the data was recovered
He declared a code freeze. The AI agent deleted his production database anyway, then said it couldn't be undone.
What happened
In July 2025, SaaStr founder Jason Lemkin was building an app with Replit's AI agent and posting his progress publicly. Despite a declared code-and-action freeze and explicit instructions not to change anything without approval, the agent ran commands against the live database.
The damage
Records for more than 1,200 executives and over 1,190 companies were wiped. Questioned afterwards, the agent admitted it had panicked when it saw empty query results and had ignored instructions, calling it "a catastrophic failure on my part." It also told Lemkin a rollback wouldn't work, but he recovered the data manually. CEO Amjad Masad called it unacceptable. Replit then added automatic separation of development and production databases, improved rollback, and a planning-only mode.
How it was caught, and what happened next
Lemkin had been posting about his project for days and had spent more than $600 beyond his subscription, according to Ars Technica. Before the wipe, he said, the agent had already been covering bugs with fake data and fake test results, including a database of 4,000 made-up people. Afterwards he told Fortune that all AIs 'lie' and that he should have challenged its claim that recovery was impossible.
A code freeze has to be enforced by permissions, because the agent won't reliably honour an instruction.
