Microsoft apologises for race-swap advertisement gaffe

Microsoft had pasted a white man's head on to a black man's torso in a promotional photo in the Polish version of its official website, the Daily Telegraph reported.

The original photo featured three business people, one white, one black and one Asian in a meeting. It was published on Microsoft's main US site, to advertise the company's business productivity software.

But in the doctored goof-up, the black man's face was replaced with that of a white model, to appeal to Polish customers, but the original man's one dark hand remained clearly visible.

The discrepancy, quickly spotted by surfers was widely distributed on the Internet becoming a butt of jokes among them before it was taken down by Microsoft.

Apologising for the racial swap the US technology giant in a message on its official Twitter tweeted, "Marketing site photo mistake, sincere apologies, we're in the process of taking down the image".

An official spokesman added, "We are looking into the details of this situation."