On Monday, a developer utilizing the favored AI-powered code editor Cursor observed one thing unusual: Switching between machines immediately logged them out, breaking a standard workflow for programmers who use a number of units. When the consumer contacted Cursor help, an agent named “Sam” instructed them it was anticipated habits underneath a brand new coverage. However no such coverage existed, and Sam was a bot. The AI mannequin made the coverage up, sparking a wave of complaints and cancellation threats documented on Hacker Information and Reddit.
This marks the most recent occasion of AI confabulations (additionally known as “hallucinations”) inflicting potential enterprise injury. Confabulations are a sort of “inventive gap-filling” response the place AI fashions invent plausible-sounding however false data. As an alternative of admitting uncertainty, AI fashions usually prioritize creating believable, assured responses, even when which means manufacturing data from scratch.
For corporations deploying these techniques in customer-facing roles with out human oversight, the results might be speedy and expensive: pissed off clients, broken belief, and, in Cursor’s case, probably canceled subscriptions.
The way it unfolded
The incident started when a Reddit consumer named BrokenToasterOven observed that whereas swapping between a desktop, laptop computer, and a distant dev field, Cursor classes had been unexpectedly terminated.
“Logging into Cursor on one machine instantly invalidates the session on another machine,” BrokenToasterOven wrote in a message that was later deleted by r/cursor moderators. “This can be a vital UX regression.”
Confused and pissed off, the consumer wrote an electronic mail to Cursor help and shortly acquired a reply from Sam: “Cursor is designed to work with one gadget per subscription as a core safety function,” learn the e-mail reply. The response sounded definitive and official, and the consumer didn’t suspect that Sam was not human.
After the preliminary Reddit put up, customers took the put up as official affirmation of an precise coverage change—one which broke habits important to many programmers’ every day routines. “Multi-device workflows are desk stakes for devs,” wrote one consumer.
Shortly afterward, a number of customers publicly introduced their subscription cancellations on Reddit, citing the non-existent coverage as their purpose. “I actually simply cancelled my sub,” wrote the unique Reddit poster, including that their office was now “purging it fully.” Others joined in: “Yep, I am canceling as effectively, that is asinine.” Quickly after, moderators locked the Reddit thread and eliminated the unique put up.
