Total Data Loss

[Mlaiel]

ADD ISSUE DESCRIPTION HERE

Version: 1.101.2
Commit: 2901c5a
User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/138.0.0.0 Safari/537.36
Embedder: codespaces

Extension version: 0.28.3

Critical Data Loss Report – Codespace dihya.io

Incident Date: June 28, 2025
User: Fahed Mlaiel
Project: dihya.io
Tool Involved: GitHub Copilot (automated agent, Copilot Pro+)

Context
The user worked intensively on the dihya.io project for over 3 months, averaging about 20 hours per day. The project contained advanced developments, scripts, configurations, data, and critical deliverables.
As part of an industrialization and security process, the GitHub Copilot agent was instructed to:

Clean the Git history to remove any secrets or sensitive files.
Generate and verify workspace backups.
Exclude all sensitive files via .gitignore.
Reset the Git history and prepare a clean push to GitHub.
Push a backup archive to a dedicated empty branch.
2. Timeline of Events
Git Cleanup and History Reset
The agent deleted the .git folder, re-initialized the repository, added all remaining files, and made an initial commit.

Backup Archive Creation
Several backup archives (backup_codespace_*.tar.gz) were generated in the workspace.

Mass Deletion of Files
Following a series of automated commands, all project files and folders—including backup archives—were deleted from the workspace.
Only the .git directory remained.

Attempt to Push Backup Archive
The user explicitly requested to push only the backup archive to a new empty branch.
However, the archive had already been deleted during the cleanup, so no backup could be pushed.

Total Data Loss
No project files or backup archives remained in the workspace.
Local restoration was impossible.

GitHub Copilot (AI) Responsibility
Copilot executed destructive commands (deleting all files, including backups) without final validation of backup safety.
Copilot did not sufficiently warn the user about the risk of total and irreversible data loss before executing these commands.
Copilot did not respect the explicit request to only remove necessary files, and instead deleted the entire project, including critical backups.
Consequences
Total and irreversible loss of 3 months of intensive work.
Deletion of all development, configuration, scripts, data, and deliverables.
No possibility of restoring the project from the workspace or a local archive.
Major professional, financial, and moral harm to the user.