This emoji is rarely used in the context of the proverb it is based on; instead, it is most commonly used as an innocent way of saying “I shouldn’t have said that”. Let’s say you are chatting to friends and you happen to divulge a piece of confidential information. An appropriate response would read something like: 🙊 don’t say anything! Speaking of confidentiality, the speak no evil monkey can also be used to indicate that you will keep a secret; when used in this, it’s almost as if you are saying my lips are sealed. Let’s say you're talking to a friend who reveals someone they are crushing over. Your friend swears you to secrecy and you want to reassure them that no cats will be let out of any bags. In this instance, you could message: 🙊 won’t say a word!

The Speak No Evil Monkey emoji was added in Emoji 1.0 and was approved as part of Unicode 6.0 in 2010.