Vibe coding isn’t the problem, CTO says—it’s human oversight

What if the vibes aren’t as bad as we think?

That’s the question UneeQ CTO Tyler Merritt is asking. The IT C-suiter isn’t sure the fears over vibe coding security are substantiated—and thinks the industry is looking in the wrong places for how to manage threats.

“There’s ultimately a human that has the responsibility to make sure that bugs or security holes don’t go out,” Merritt said. “Focusing on the tool as the problem is shifting the blame away from where it needs to be, which is making sure you have a rigorous process and it’s followed.”

Gathering the vibes. Using AI to code is growing in importance for IT teams and lay users alike. The technology is speeding up coding by allowing users to build apps and services without years of training. Its most vociferous advocates believe vibe coding could reshape the way the public interacts with the tech industry and lead to increased productivity gains.

But along with that promise comes the reality of an expanding attack surface—as well as the risk that vibe-coders are often integrating open-source code without checking it for malware.

Merritt acknowledges that danger, but feels that some of the solutions suggested by security experts can be overly harsh. Overly restricting the use of a new technology, he said, won’t help things; of larger concern is where the code is placed, its vulnerabilities, and how it’s managed.

“None of us are tenure experts in the vibe-coding field; it hasn’t been around that long,” Merritt said. “Anybody with a position right now—it’s good, it’s bad, it’s useless, it’s the best thing ever—all of those positions are quite nascent in terms of the experience and the corpus of data we’ve gathered.”

Put into practice. For IT teams struggling with how to deploy vibe coding in a responsible way, there are a number of options. Some organizations are going to be restrictive, while others will have a more open relationship with utilizing AI.

“Philosophically, it comes back to encourage people to do their best and look for ways to lift people up and try and remove anxiety,” Merritt said.