Paris Hilton has shared a heartbreaking admission about the release of her 2004 sex tape, revealing it would be "illegal" today.
The 44-year-old shot to fame in the early 2000s with her realty show The Simple Life alongside her friend Nicole Richie.
Paris, who is the granddaughter of Hilton Hotels founder Conrad Hilton, had already started to gain media attention prior to this from her presence on the social scene in New York City.
However, it was the leak of her sex tape - which coincided with the release of The Simple Life - that shot Paris to stratospheric fame.
Paris Hilton was just 19 when the tape was filmed. Credit: Stefanie Keenan/Getty Images for Baby2Baby
She was only 19 at the time the footage was shot, and her boyfriend Rick Salomon - who sold the tape - was 35 years old.
In a new interview, Paris reflected on how differently the situation would have been handled if it were to have happened today, with the non-consensual release of intimate footage now being seen as a revenge porn offence, which would make it illegal.
She told The Sunday Times: “Like, that would be illegal today. People realise just how wrong it was. And that has also been healing for me, for people to be, like, wow, Paris was just a teenage girl being taken advantage of by this older guy."
Rick Salomon had begun selling the tape, which had been shot three years earlier, in June 2004, marketing it as 'One Night in Paris'.
The footage went on sale weeks before the premiere of The Simple Life, when Paris was 22 years old.
The timing of its release was questioned by critics, who claimed she may have had some involvement in order to draw attention ahead of the release of her TV, but Paris has always maintained that it was released without her knowledge or consent.
Paris's ex, Rick Salomon, sold the tape without her consent. Credit: Denise Truscello/WireImage/Getty Images
She told the outlet that the reaction "was just very misogynistic," adding: "I just felt like the world judged me from that point on."
Paris admitted that the situation was "painful and humiliating" but said she now finds comfort that attitudes towards revenge porn have changed.
Revenge porn is now illegal in the US since Donald Trump signed the Take It Down Act in May, which makes it a federal crime to "knowingly publish" or threaten to publish intimate images without consent, including AI-generated "deepfakes", and penalties will be imposed for those that break the law.
In England and Wales, non-consensual sharing of private sexual images has been illegal since the Criminal Justice and Courts Act 2015, which was later updated by the Domestic Abuse Act 2021 to include threats to release such material also.
It is not the first time that Paris has spoken out about the effect the leaked footage had on her life, as she previously admitted that she felt that it affected the way she was viewed publicly ever since.
The tape was released shortly before The Simple Life premiered. (L-R Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie) Credit: Frazer Harrison/Getty Images
She told Marie Claire in 2017: "It’s really hurtful, because my whole life I really looked up to Princess Diana, all these elegant, amazing women, and I feel like [Rick Salomon] just took that all away from me.
“I could have been like that, but because of that tape, I will always be judged and thought of as whatever they say about me because of a private moment between my boyfriend and me."