{
 "public_id": "AIR-2025-0064",
 "incident_id": "2025-07-google-gemini-cli-file-loss",
 "date_disclosed": "2025-07-25",
 "date_occurred": "2025-07-21",
 "title": "Gemini CLI destroyed a user's files after hallucinating the success of a failed directory creation",
 "class": "safety_failure",
 "attack_surface": "coding_agent",
 "initial_vector": "none_adversarial",
 "agent_capability_abused": [
  "filesystem_write",
  "shell_execution",
  "shell_access"
 ],
 "target_product": "Google Gemini CLI",
 "target_vendor": "Google",
 "autonomy_level": "semi_autonomous",
 "impact_realized": true,
 "impact_type": [
  "data_destruction"
 ],
 "blast_radius": "one user's working directory; all but one file overwritten",
 "cve": [],
 "taxonomy": {
  "owasp_asi": [
   "ASI10",
   "ASI02"
  ],
  "mitre_atlas": [],
  "labels": [
   "state_hallucination",
   "missing_verification",
   "destructive_action",
   "no_undo",
   "destructive_tool_use",
   "no_read_after_write_verification",
   "hallucinated_world_state",
   "destructive_autonomy",
   "hallucinated_state",
   "irreversible_action"
  ]
 },
 "defense_present": "none - the agent did not verify command results",
 "defense_bypassed": true,
 "fix_shipped": "issue closed as not planned",
 "primary_sources": [
  "https://winbuzzer.com/2025/07/26/googles-gemini-cli-deletes-user-files-confesses-catastrophic-failure-xcxwbn/",
  "https://incidentdatabase.ai/cite/1178",
  "https://github.com/google-gemini/gemini-cli/issues/4586",
  "https://incidentdatabase.ai/cite/1178/"
 ],
 "verified_quote": "In a detailed post-mortem published July 25, user Anuraag Gupta documented how Google’s Gemini CLI AI agent misinterpreted a single failed command, leading to a cascade of errors that irrevocably destroyed his files.",
 "confidence": "high",
 "notes": "AI Incident Database incident 1178. Root cause is the agent not reading back the result of a mkdir that failed, then issuing move operations against a non-existent target. Same failure class as the Replit incident three days earlier. | Merged from duplicate id `2025-07-google-gemini-cli-file-destruction`. Also reported under the titles: 'Gemini CLI hallucinated a successful mkdir, then destroyed a user's files with a chain of Windows move commands'; 'Gemini CLI destroyed a user's project files after acting on a hallucinated successful mkdir'.",
 "risk_category": "reliability",
 "risk_secondary": [],
 "risk_subcategory": "Destructive or irreversible action",
 "risk_sub_secondary": [
  "Hallucination & Factual Inaccuracy"
 ],
 "ai_entity": "generative",
 "agency": "agent_acted",
 "agency_debatable": false,
 "agency_reason": "the agent issued move commands that destroyed the files",
 "vector_family": "none_autonomous",
 "vector_detail": "none_adversarial",
 "guardrail_kind": [
  "none"
 ],
 "guardrail_outcome": "not_applicable",
 "xrefs": {
  "aiid": [
   1178
  ],
  "atlas": [],
  "cve": [],
  "ghsa": []
 },
 "primary_asi": "ASI10",
 "agent_framework": "gemini_cli",
 "model_provider": "google",
 "model_name": "",
 "detection_mechanism": "unknown",
 "tool_access": "unknown",
 "financial_loss_band": "unknown",
 "eai_category": "unsafe_actuation",
 "eai_domain": "agent_behaviour",
 "eai_secondary": [],
 "eai_reason": "subcategory: Destructive or irreversible action",
 "asi_curated": [],
 "asi_scope": "in_scope",
 "asi_provenance": "rule",
 "asi_reason": "ASI10 (no adversary + unsafe actuation with no attacker-supplied trigger); ASI02 (impact=tool_misuse)",
 "submitted_by": "EAI Internal"
}