LONDON, Nov 17 — Paris Hilton, 44, has reflected on the infamous 2004 sex tape that defined much of her early career, saying its non-consensual release would be considered an illegal act of “revenge porn” today.
In a new interview with The Sunday Times, the media personality spoke about how the world now understands the exploitative nature of the incident.
In June 2004, Hilton’s former boyfriend, Rick Salomon, then 35, began selling a private video of the pair that was filmed three years earlier, when she was 19.
Marketed as One Night in Paris, the tape was released just weeks before the premiere of her reality show, The Simple Life.
While critics questioned the timing, Hilton has always maintained it was released without her consent.
Hilton described the public reaction at the time as “very misogynistic,”.
“I just felt like the world judged me from that point on,” she said.
However, she said she now takes comfort in the fact that attitudes have changed.
“People realise just how wrong it was,” she said. “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.”
Her assertion that the act would be “illegal today” is supported by significant legal changes in both the US and the UK.
In May 2024, the Take It Down Act was signed into law in the US, making it a federal crime to knowingly publish intimate images without consent, including AI-generated “deepfakes.”
Similarly, in England and Wales, sharing private sexual images without consent became illegal under the Criminal Justice and Courts Act 2015.
Despite the sense of healing, Hilton has previously spoken about the long-term damage the tape did to her reputation, preventing her from being viewed in the same light as “elegant, amazing women” like Princess Diana.
“I could have been like that,” she told Marie Claire in 2017, “but because of that tape, I will always be judged.”
