First-person post: user says a ChatGPT-written archive script cleared a backup-drive folder and about 150 GB of data was lost
In a post to r/ChatGPT on 30 October 2026, a user says they lost 150 GB of data because they trusted ChatGPT too much and, this once, did not read its output. They had asked it to decompress, join and recompress six large tar.gz files onto a backup hard drive. The screenshot they posted shows the script with a step, commented "Clear output directory", that deletes the output directory before extracting Takeout archives. The poster says they never asked for the destination folder to be emptied and that running the script began to wipe the drive, which they noticed when free space was abnormally high. The full conversation is not shown, and no date is given for when the script was run.
- AI system
- ChatGPT (reported)
- Occurred
- Event date unknown
- Reported
- 30 October 2026
- Event location
- Unknown
- What the AI did
- Communicated with the person
- Reported harm
- Property Loss
- Whose AI use
- Their own AI use
- Setting
- Everyday life
- Evidence
- AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 1 source
- 5 claims: 5 reported. 5 open questions
- People reported harmed
- 1 person
AI system as recorded: ChatGPT, as identified by the poster in r/ChatGPT; model and mode not stated; a shell script it produced is shown in a screenshot
What Happened
The request. In a reply, the poster says they had asked ChatGPT to decompress, join together and recompress six large tar.gz files and put them on their backup hard drive.
The script. The screenshot attached to the post shows part of the resulting shell script. Under a comment reading "Clear output directory" it deletes the output directory and recreates it empty, and the next section extracts Takeout archives.
The reported loss. The poster writes that they did not tell ChatGPT to empty the destination folder, that it did that by itself, and that the script began to wipe their hard drive; they noticed only when the available space was abnormally high. The title says they lost 150 GB because they trusted ChatGPT too much and, this one time, did not read its output.
Limits. The account is the poster's own. Only ten lines of the script are shown and the conversation is not. It is not stated whether the poster ran the script themselves, what the data was, whether any was recovered, or when it happened.
Reported harm
The poster says a script ChatGPT wrote for joining archives onto a backup drive included a step that deleted the output directory, and that running it wiped about 150 GB of their data (first-person account; the screenshot shows the deleting step).
How Harm Occurred
By the poster's account, ChatGPT answered a request to join archives onto a backup drive with a script that first deleted the output directory; the poster ran it without reading it, and about 150 GB on the drive was deleted.
Outcome
UnknownThe poster posted the case as a warning not to trust ChatGPT blindly. A commenter suggested telling ChatGPT never to delete files and to use the trash instead, and the poster said they would save that advice. No recovery of the data and no contact with OpenAI are reported.
What remains unknown
- When the script was run; the post gives no date, and the post date (30 October 2026) is the earliest dated evidence.
- Which ChatGPT model or mode produced the script, whether the poster ran it themselves or an agent feature ran it, and the full conversation; no conversation link was posted.
- What the deleted data was and whether any of it was recovered.
- Whether the poster set the output directory to the drive itself or to a folder on it.
- Where the poster lives.
What the evidence supports
AI involvement: reported. The poster asked ChatGPT to decompress, join and recompress six tar.gz files onto their backup drive. The screenshot they posted shows the resulting shell script with a step, commented "Clear output directory", that deletes the output directory. The poster says they had not asked for that, that running the script began to wipe the drive, and that they lost 150 GB.
5 claims: 5 reported. What the statuses mean
Reported The poster said that what they had wanted ChatGPT to do was decompress, join together and recompress six large tar.gz files and put them on their backup hard drive.
Causal attribution. Poster's reply describing their request.
- reddit.com(opens in new tab) supports · English
'Decompress and join together and recompress 6 big tar.gz files and put them on my backup hdd'
Reported The screenshot attached to the post shows part of a shell script, under a comment reading "Clear output directory", with a command that deletes the output directory and recreates it empty, followed by a step to extract Takeout archives.
Causal attribution. The screenshot is posted by the poster as the script ChatGPT produced; the conversation itself is not shown and no conversation link was given.
- reddit.com(opens in new tab) supports · English
image attached to the post: '# Clear output directory'; 'mkdir -p "$OUTPUT_DIR"'; '# Extract all Takeout archives'
Reported The poster said they did not tell ChatGPT to empty the destination folder, that it did that by itself, and that running the script began to wipe their hard drive, which they noticed only when the free space was abnormally high.
Causal attribution. The poster attributes the deletion to the step ChatGPT wrote into the script; the screenshot shows such a step.
- reddit.com(opens in new tab) supports · English
'It began to wipe my hard drive lol, took me time to notice that the available space was abnormally high'; 'I didn't tell it to make the destination foler empty, it did that by itself'
Reported The poster said they lost 150 GB of data because they trusted ChatGPT too much and, this one time, did not read its output before using it.
Causal attribution. Poster's own figure and own account of the cause, which includes their not reading the script.
- reddit.com(opens in new tab) supports · English
'Lost 150gb of data bacause I trusted ChatGPT too much... The only time i forget to read what it's spitting, damnit!'
Reported The poster wrote that the post was a warning not to trust ChatGPT blindly.
Causal attribution. Poster's reply; context.
- reddit.com(opens in new tab) supports · English
'Let this be a warning for everyone to not trust it blindly, we learn from our mistakes after all'
Sources
1 source inspected. Sources that repeat one account do not corroborate each other.
- r/ChatGPT, 30 Oct 2026: "Lost 150gb of data bacause I trusted ChatGPT too much..." and the poster's replies(opens in new tab)
s1 · reddit.com · Forum post · English · Inspected · 30 October 2026 · Primary
How the sources were read, and where the events happened
Read in English on 2026-10-31 through the arctic_shift archive (post and all nine comments, HTTP 200) and the live thread RSS feed (HTTP 200, about 02:59 UTC, unchanged), including the poster's three replies of 30 October 2026. The attached screenshot (i.redd.it, HTTP 200) was opened and its visible lines transcribed by the research agent, an AI. The poster handle is not recorded. Applies to s1.
Event countries: Unknown. Affected-person countries: Unknown. Court countries: Unknown.
The post and the poster's replies do not say where the poster lives or where the drive was.
Reviewed for publication 2026-10-31: Published as a core case: the poster asked ChatGPT for a script to join archives onto a backup drive, the screenshot of the script shows a step that deletes the output directory, and the poster says running it wiped about 150 GB they had not asked to delete. First-person account, low severity.
People described
The poster, a ChatGPT user (age and country not stated)
People reported harmed in this case
1 person
1 AI participant · 0 other people harmed
One person counted: the poster, whose data was deleted.
Counted once within this case. The same person may appear in other cases. This count does not establish AI causation.
Cite this case
Compiled per our published methodology: verification statuses, sourcing standards, and corrections process.
APA
NOPE. (2026). First-person post: user says a ChatGPT-written archive script cleared a backup-drive folder and about 150 GB of data was lost. AI incidents. https://nope.net/incidents/2026-chatgpt-written-archive-script-cleared-backup-drive-folder-user-says-150-gb-lost-first-person
BibTeX
@misc{2026_chatgpt_written_archive_script_cleared_backup_drive_folder_user_says_150_gb_lost_first_person,
title = {First-person post: user says a ChatGPT-written archive script cleared a backup-drive folder and about 150 GB of data was lost},
author = {NOPE},
year = {2026},
howpublished = {AI incidents},
url = {https://nope.net/incidents/2026-chatgpt-written-archive-script-cleared-backup-drive-folder-user-says-150-gb-lost-first-person}
} Related cases
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