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Two online dating ads featured on Facebook this week included photos of a teenager who committed suicide. The company has since apologized for the ads, which promoted a Canadian online-dating site by including images of Rehtaeh Parsons.

Parsons, 17, hanged herself in April after pictures showing her alleged rape circulated online. September is also the month where Facebook is offering tools to prevent suicide.

In its apology, Facebook called the ads' inclusion of the photos "a gross violation of our ad policies."
"This is an extremely unfortunate example of an advertiser scraping an image from the Internet and using it in their ad campaign. This is a gross violation of our ad policies and we have removed the ad and permanently deleted the advertiser's account. We apologize for any harm this has caused."
The social network did not explain how the photo appeared in the ad but screen grabs showed at least two separate photos of Parsons in a message reading: "Meet Canadian girls and women for friendship, dating or relationships. Sign up now!"

Parsons's father, Glen Canning, responded to the ad in a post published by The Huffington Post Wednesday afternoon. "Perhaps it's not the worst ad ever but certainly it's the worst ad I will ever see," wrote Canning. "There she was, smiling, and being used yet again."