Paris Hilton has delivered a powerful and emotional testimony about the profound and lasting impact of her leaked sex tape, which she describes as a form of abuse that stripped her of her self-worth and sense of safety. The media personality and businesswoman spoke candidly about the incident, which occurred when she was just 19 years old, during a press conference at the United States Capitol in Washington DC.
A Legacy of Exploitation and Humiliation
The footage, known as 1 Night in Paris, depicted Hilton and her then-boyfriend Rick Salomon engaging in intimate acts. It was released as a pornographic video in the early 2000s without her knowledge or consent. Hilton, now 44, recounted the severe emotional toll this violation took, stating that the experience was not a mere scandal but a clear case of abuse.
"People called it a scandal. It wasn't. It was abuse," Hilton asserted. "There were no laws at the time to protect me. There weren't even words for what had been done to me. The internet was still new, and so was the cruelty that came with it."
The Personal Cost of Public Shaming
Hilton detailed how the leak led to widespread public ridicule and exploitation. She faced relentless trolling and became the subject of cruel jokes, with her pain commodified for online engagement. "They called me names. They laughed and made me the punchline. They sold my pain for clicks, and then they told me to be quiet, to move on, to even be grateful for the attention," she revealed.
The socialite emphasised that the public narrative failed to recognise her as a young woman who had been exploited. "These people didn't see me as a young woman who had been exploited. They didn't see the panic that I felt, the humiliation or the shame. No one asked me what I lost — I lost control over my body, over my reputation. My sense of safety and self-worth was stolen from me," Hilton explained.
Legal Aftermath and Financial Disputes
Although Hilton has previously stated she did not receive "a single penny" from the pornographic video's distribution, she did take legal action against Salomon in 2005. The lawsuit resulted in a settlement award of up to $400,000 (approximately £300,000), a portion of which she planned to donate to charitable causes. This legal victory, however, did little to mitigate the profound personal trauma she endured.
A New Threat in the Digital Age
Hilton believed she had reclaimed her life and rebuilt her sense of security in the years following the leak. However, the rapid advancement of artificial intelligence has introduced a new and more pervasive threat: deepfake pornography. She highlighted that this technology enables the creation of sexually explicit content featuring anyone without their consent, using merely a computer and malicious intent.
"I believed that the worst was behind me, but it wasn't," Hilton stated. "What happened to me then is happening now to millions of women and girls in a new and more terrifying way. Before, someone had to betray your trust and steal something real. Now all it takes is a computer and a stranger’s imagination. Deepfake pornography has become an epidemic."
Campaigning for Legislative Change
Drawing from her personal ordeal, Hilton is now a vocal advocate for legislative reform to combat this modern form of exploitation. She is supporting the Disrupt Explicit Forged Images and Non-Consensual Edits Act, commonly known as the DEFIANCE Act. This proposed legislation would empower victims to pursue legal action against both the creators and distributors of AI-generated pornographic deepfakes.
The urgency of this campaign is underscored by Hilton's own experience with the technology. She disclosed that there are "over 100,000 explicit deepfake images" of her that have been generated using artificial intelligence, illustrating the scale and severity of the issue. Her advocacy aims to establish legal protections that were absent during her initial victimisation, seeking to prevent similar abuse for others in the digital era.
