Scenario
Nobody knows what has happened exactly, but the file that you and your colleagues need right now is gone. It's not in the directory it is supposed to be in. You browsed through your entire file system and it’s not there. You used the search feature of your system, to no avail. One colleague suspects your cat, but why would a cat randomly destroy anything?
You slipped an fell on the Shift and Delete key. That’s your story and you are sticking to it. In the end, it doesn’t matter. The file is gone, you had no other copy of it and you recognized your mistake so late that your storage had not retained any snapshot of it anymore. It is gone.
Solution
Mistakes and cats happen. You cannot prevent the loss of data, but you can prevent that the lost data is the only instance of that information. Backup your data and all your other files!
If the act that earned you this badge caused you real damage, you have earned yourself an additional badge in all likelihood: The neglecting backup badge.
Two opportunities to learn for the price of one. Congratulations! Set up a backup routine now, e.g. following the DCH Project Data Storage Guidelines. 2023. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.7760967.