1 min lesson
How agents reshape the coverage problem
Work through this. "Cursor's security team says agents have 'lowered the bar on the level of depth we can cover for all changes.' What does that actually mean, and why is it a bigger deal than just reviewing faster?"
Step 1 of 2
Security has always been a sampling problem. No team reviews every PR in real depth, threat-models every change or ramps into every unfamiliar system. Capable, tireless agents move the bar on all three at once.
This is the honest answer to "what does your impact look like day to day?" Cursor's security team frames the payoff as covering depth that was never tenable before.
The point isn't speed for its own sake. Practices that used to be a luxury, like deep review on a sampled few changes, become the default on every change.
What it's really done in my opinion is lower the bar on the level of depth that we can cover for all changes. Things like threat modeling for any change that were previously untenable are now tenable.
The honest version of the math: on older models one engineer described agents as making him roughly 5x more effective, and closer to 7.5 to 10x now. Take the multiple loosely. What lasts is the claim that agents let you do more to protect the business and ramp into systems you've never touched in hours instead of a week.