A Nova Scotia newspaper has apologized after printing a classified ad many have deemed racist.

The ad, which appeared online and in print in the Cape Breton Post on Wednesday, was for a two-bedroom rental house in Sydney, N.S. With the wording of the ad appearing to suggest that the house will only be rented to a “white” family, readers were quick to decry the “racist” ad on social media.

When CTV News tried calling the Alberta cellphone number listed in the ad, the call went straight to voicemail. Text messages to the number also went unanswered.

One Facebook user posted a screengrab of a text message purportedly received from the landlord.

“It has no meaning,” the message reads. “House has white siding. Ad has to be very short. Every line costs extra dollars.”

With no address posted, CTV News was unable to verify if in fact the house is white.

Nova Scotia’s Human Rights Commission confirms that it has been made aware of the ad. It would not confirm, however, if a complaint has been made, stating that complaints only become public once they go before a board of inquiry.

In the meantime, the Cape Breton Post has issued an apology.

“The Cape Breton Post sincerely apologizes to our print and online readers for an ad that was inadvertently published in the Wednesday, Aug. 24 edition,” a statement posted on their website reads. “We have taken measures to ensure that this doesn’t happen again.”

Helen MacCoy, the paper’s director of reader sales and distribution, also issued a statement on Facebook.

“Please believe that we were just as appalled you (sic) when we saw this ad in print in the Cape Breton Post newspaper this morning; for which we must take responsibility,” MacCoy said. “We have never had a problem like this before and will be much more diligent when monitoring our automated ad content from this day forward.”

The newspaper’s online classified service is not monitored by staff. While the automated system can pick up on things like foul language, it can’t flag seemingly innocuous words such as “white.”

“We’re seeing a failure of technology that would have been prevented, most likely, by having a human review those ads,” advertising consultant Marc Botte told CTV Atlantic.

“Technology can't decipher intent. Technology can't pick up on racism. Technology can't pick up on bigotry, unless you're using specific words. Only humans can decipher intent."

As of Friday morning, the ad is still listed online, albeit in a white-washed form. The offending word has been removed.

With files from CTV Atlantic