Madeleine McCann photo appears in travel advertisement

A British travel firm was quick to condemn the use of a photo of missing Madeleine McCann that appeared in an advertisement on its site.

"We discovered this vile material yesterday and immediately broke all the [web] links to our site and contacted our lawyers," Chief Operating Officer Lawrence Hunt of lowcostholidays.com told the BBC.

The ad, on travel deal website VoucherDigg.co.uk, used a photo of Madeleine taken hours before the youngster disappeared from a Portuguese apartment in 2007.

"We have no contract with VoucherDigg to advertise our holidays and we are doing all that we can to contact the website and get the picture removed," Hunt said in the BBC story.

Sky News reported that McCann family spokesman Clarence Mitchell said: "The misuse of Madeleine's picture in this way is utterly appalling and frankly unforgivable. Kate and Gerry (McCann) were horrified when they found out about it. It is offensive in the extreme."

Madeleine went missing along the Portuguese south coast on May 3, 2007, while her parents were at dinner.

Scotland Yard claims there are 195 "investigative opportunities" that could be followed up and have urged Portuguese authorities to reopen the case. Scotland Yard released a statement that indicated there was a "genuine possibility" Madeline could be alive.

The McCanns and British police recently released a computer-aged photo of how their daughter may look today in an effort to generate more leads.