ISSA Security Awareness Column September 2012 – Cargo Cult Security

During the course of World War Two in the Pacific there were numerous primitive cultures on remote islands that came into contact with Westerners for the first time. Islanders were particularly impressed with the cargo that the visitors brought with them. At the conclusion of World War Two most of the visitors left and the cargo stopped arriving. Across multiple islands separated by thousands of miles a strange phenomenon occurred. Primitive cultures attempted to invite new cargo by imitating the conditions of what was happening when the cargo was arriving. They cleared spaces for aircraft landing strips and “controllers” dressed up with vines for wires and sticks for microphones. Bizarre ritualised behaviour developed around the use of artefacts like uniforms and insignias. “Cargo Cult” behaviour was a phrase coined by the scientist Richard Feynman to explain activity that occurs where appearances are superficially imitated. A result is pursued without actually understanding the underlying mechanisms of cause and effect. Pre-requisites are mistaken for causation. The pattern across so many independent island cultures suggests that this confusion is part of human nature. A good causation parody you may have heard of is a lack of pirates causes global warming.