Snapchat, Instagram pull out GIPHY feature over criticisms on ‘racist’ GIF image

Snapchat. AFP Relaxnews photo; Instagram. AFP photo.

Are you having fun with GIFs when you use them on Snapchat and Instagram Stories? If your answer is yes, this is bad news for you.

The two social media giants have pulled out the GIPHY feature. This comes after a GIF image containing a racial slur was discovered to be part of their catalog.

A GIF image that read “N***** Crime Death Counter  — Keep Cranking Bonzo, the Numbers Just Keep on Climbing!”, featuring a monkey, triggered netizens.

Netizen @Miss_Simonee shared the image on her Twitter page last Saturday.

Snapchat had partnered with a firm called “Giphy” in order to get their gifs. But they recently received a report about a racist gif that was available and they removed the entire feature from the app. The gif said “n***** crime death counter” along w/ a monkey pic.twitter.com/HT2shsASpP

— •simon with an e• (@Misss_Simonee) March 9, 2018

Snapchat immediately disabled the feature, TechCrunch reported. A spokesperson for the social media site said the company is awaiting “for Giphy’s team to take a look at it.” Instagram followed suit after it found the GIF available on its platform.

A spokesperson for GIPHY said that their team is now looking into the issue. “After investigation of the incident, this sticker was available due to a bug in our content moderation filters specifically affecting GIF stickers,” he told Engadget. “We have fixed the bug and have re-moderated all of the GIF stickers in our library.” Katrina Hallare/JB

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