Last month after users discovered a racist GIF on GIPHY which was also integrated into Instagram and Snapchat, both companies opted to temporarily disable the feature. However the good news for Instagram users is that integration was re-enabled last month, but Snapchat users were still left hanging.
For those who are using Snapchat and miss the GIFs, you’ll be pleased to learn that Snapchat has since restored GIF functionality. We’re not sure why it took Snapchat longer to implement these changes compared to Instagram, but we guess better late than never, so Snapchat users can go back to integrating GIFs in their uploads.
As for GIPHY, the company told The Verge that “a bug in our content moderation filters specifically affecting GIF stickers” was what allowed the racist GIF to surface in the first place. The company has since apologized for the issue and claims that they have since gone through their database several times to try and detect other potential problematic GIFs.
They have also stated that they have also put into place certain measures that will prevent racist GIFs from appearing in its library again. Whether or not these measures will hold remains to be seen, but hopefully they will.