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Garbage in, garbage out ( abbreviated to GIGO, possibly intended to parallel the phrase first-in, first-out ) is a phrase in the field of computer science or information and communication technology.

It is used primarily to call attention to the fact that computers will unquestioningly process the most nonsensical of input data (" garbage in ") and produce nonsensical output (" garbage out ").

It was most popular in the early days of computing, but applies even more today, when powerful computers can spew out mountains of erroneous information in a short time.

The first use of the term has been dated to a 1 April 1963 syndicated newspaper article about the first stages of computerization of the US Internal Revenue Service.

The term was brought to prominence as a teaching mantra by George Fuechsel, an IBM 305 RAMAC technician / instructor in New York.

Early programmers were required to test virtually each program step and cautioned not to expect that the resulting program would " do the right thing " when given imperfect input.

The underlying principle was noted by the inventor of the first programmable computing device design: