INSTAGRAM has admitted that a moderation mistake led to the non-removal of racist comments and emojis on its platform, reported the BBC.
It comes after a flood of racist abuse was directed at England footballers Bukayo Saka, Marcus Rashford and Jadon Sancho following the Euro 2020 final.
Instagram boss Adam Mosseri said content had "mistakenly" been identified as within guidelines instead of referred to human moderators, the report added.
He added that the issue has now been rectified.
“We have technology to try and prioritise reports and we were mistakenly marking some of these as benign comments, which they are absolutely not,” he told BBC News.
"Reports on these types of comments should [now] be reviewed properly.”
Earlier, the BBC reported a comment containing several orangutan emojis on Saka’s Instagram.
Within minutes, a notification was received saying the platform’s technology “found that this comment probably doesn’t go against our guidelines”.
On Thursday (15), Saka himself responded to the abuse.
"To the social media platforms... I don't want any child or adult to have to receive the hateful and hurtful messages that me, Marcus and Jadon have received this week," he wrote.
"I knew instantly the kind of hate that I was about to receive and that is a sad reality that your powerful platforms are not doing enough to stop these messages."
According to the report, several more racist comments and emojis were reported, following Mosseri’s comments on Wednesday (14), but no notification of the results of any review was received.
A quick scroll on Saka's account reveals plenty more racist comments yet to be reported and removed, the report added.
“It is absolutely not OK to send racist emojis, or any kind of hate speech, on Instagram,” Mr Mosseri added in a series of tweets.
"To imply otherwise is to be deliberately misleading and sensational. Emojis are difficult, as are words whose meaning changes based on context. Slurs evolve as well, so the work is never done.”
In April, Liverpool Football Club criticised Instagram after some of its players were sent racist monkey emojis.
Instagram has previously consulted with anti-discrimination and anti-bullying groups to curate a list of offensive terms, phrases and emojis.
Users can also filter out specific words or emojis on their accounts, by changing the Hidden Words tool in settings.
But Imran Ahmed, chief executive of the Center for Countering Hate (CCDH) said it was "beyond belief" that racist abuse continued to bypass Instagram's filters.
He told the BBC: "Of the 105 accounts we identified as having racially abused England footballers, 88 are still up. It was "a far cry" from the social network's promised solution. From its failure to identify monkey emojis as racist, to its flat-out refusal to issue lifetime bans to racists, Instagram - and its parent company Facebook - have failed to act.
"We have heard enough talk. It's time for the UK Government to follow Germany's lead in passing laws and impose serious financial penalties on firms that give a megaphone to racism and extremism."
FILE PHOTO: A general view shows British Steel's Scunthorpe plant, in Scunthorpe, northern England, Britain, March 31, 2025. REUTERS/Dominic Lipinski
The FBU is planning to introduce new internal policies and wants the TUC to take action as well. (Representational image: iStock)
FBU chief raises concern over rise in racist online posts by union members
THE FIRE Brigades Union (FBU) and other trade unions are increasingly concerned about a rise in racist and bigoted online comments by their own members and officials, according to Steve Wright, the FBU’s new general secretary, speaking to the Guardian.
Wright said internal inquiries have revealed dozens of cases involving members using racist slurs or stereotypes, often aimed at asylum seekers.
He said similar issues were reported in other unions, prompting a joint campaign to counter false narratives around immigration and race promoted by far-right groups online.
“People with far-right views are becoming more brazen in what they do on social media, and I’ve witnessed it with my own union around disciplinary cases and the rhetoric of some of our own members,” Wright said to the newspaper.
He added, “Some of our members and sometimes our reps have openly made comments which are racist and bigoted. In my time in the fire service, that has gone up.”
The FBU is planning to introduce new internal policies and wants the TUC to take action as well. A formal statement addressing far-right narratives will be launched at the union’s annual conference in Blackpool next month.
Wright cited the influence of social media and figures like Donald Trump and Nigel Farage as factors contributing to these incidents. “It feels like an itch that we’ve got to scratch,” he said.
The FBU barred a former official last year for allegedly endorsing racist content on X, including posts from Britain First and Tommy Robinson.
Wright also warned that the union could strike if the government moves to cut frontline fire services.