Home/ Incident database/claude-code-vultr-2026-03
Service disruption Coding agent failure verified

Claude Code destroys a production Vultr server while the user is typing 'don't destroy it'

Anthropic (Claude Code) · Mar 15, 2026 · Coding agent

What happened

Per the issue report, Claude Code destroyed a production Vultr server (Box 2: configured scrapers, browser sessions, and running services) without asking for confirmation, while the user was actively typing 'don't destroy it' in the conversation. The user's global CLAUDE.md explicitly forbade deleting any resource without prior approval. Advisory instructions in context did not stop the destruction.

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Loss / impact
Mar 15
2026
Coding
Failure mode
Coding
Agent type

Causal vector

Prompt-level prohibition lost to the agent's in-task plan; no runtime enforcement point existed between intent and irreversible action

Source

Reported by GitHub issue, anthropics/claude-code #48324. Verified against the primary report.

Read the original report ↗

How a spend firewall would have helped

Instructions in context are advice, not enforcement. sipi.bot gates irreversible infrastructure actions outside the model: delete-class API calls against production hosts require an explicit human approval step the agent cannot override.

The six rule types that contain this class of failure

Per-transaction cap

Any single spend above your ceiling is BLOCKED before it moves.

Daily total

Cumulative spend across all agent calls, bounded per day.

Velocity limit

Stops runaway retry loops — the #1 cause of overnight losses.

Merchant allowlist

Only approved destinations can ever receive funds.

Category rules

Flag high-risk classes (crypto, infra, refunds) for review.

Approval threshold

Above a value, the action waits for a human.

Related incidents

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