Facebook has been forced to apologized after it was called out for a dating advertisement that featured a photo of Rehtaeh Parsons, the Canadian teen who committed suicide after being a victim of cyberbullying.

Parsons’ photo was featured in an ad that read, “Find Love in Canada! Meet Canadian girls and women for friendship, dating or relationships,” according to the Canadian Press. Andrew Ennals of Toronto told the Canadian Press that he had contacted Facebook about the ad after it popped up on his newsfeed. He was instantly shocked to see the photo of Parsons, who died in April at age 17.

A Facebook person called it a “gross violation” of its policies, adding, “This is an extremely unfortunate example of an advertiser scraping an image from the Internet and using it in their ad campaign.” The ad was later removed.

“This is a gross violation of our ad policies and we have removed the ad and permanently deleted the advertiser's account,” Facebook explained. “We apologize for any harm this has caused.”

According to The Independent, Parsons’ father, Glen Canning wrote that he was “bewildered and disgusted” by the ad after it was brought to his attention.

“That’s just disgusting to do something like that considering the circumstances of her death, where she was bullied and tormented online over a photo,” Canning told the Global News. “Now you have some company do it in an advertisement on Facebook. It’s inexcusable. I really am absolutely lost for words.”

Parsons, of Halifax, Nova Scotia, committed suicide after she was bullied online when a photo of her allegedly being sexually abused surfaced online. In August, police charged two 18-year-olds with distributing child pornography.

image: Wikimedia Commons