Nicole Scherzinger breaks silence on intimate tape leak of her and Lewis Hamilton

Nicole Scherzinger has opened up about the leak of an intimate tape which featured her ex-boyfriend, Lewis Hamilton.

The erstwhile Pussycat Dolls member was horrified by the publication of the tape in February, which saw her kissing and cuddling the Formula One racer. Scherzinger and Hamilton were in an on-again-off-again relationship for seven years, and the tape was recorded before the pair split for good in 2015.

Speaking to The Sun at an Oscars party last weekend, the 40-year-old admitted that "It’s been horrible."

"I genuinely don’t understand why someone would do something like this, or why they would leak it. It’s an unbelievably mean thing to do," Scherzinger continued.

A source for the publication also alleged that the pair are unsure of how the footage ended up online. "Nicole and Lewis were both horrified at the breach, and want to get to the bottom of it. They want to know how the hell it got leaked. It’s been mortifying for Nicole, and she feels really violated. She wants to keep a low profile for now, keep her head down and just plough on with work."

"She just wants to get on with her life, and forget this ever happened," the insider added.

Hamilton has not publicly acknowledged the leak of the tape, which has purportedly been viewed around 600,000 times.

According to The Sun, it has since been removed from the internet.

Hamilton has previously asserted that their busy schedules were ultimately responsible for their 2015 split. "It's not been easy - she lives in LA, I live in Monaco and I'm travelling a lot for work," the 34-year-old said of their relationship, which began in 2009.

"Her job is shifting all the time, whether it's X Factor or Dancing With The Stars or Cats or music," he added. "[Getting] your schedule to meet with the other is very hard, and it's a long year with F1. At one point, I flew to Asia for five weeks and couldn't see her. It's been tough."

Scherzinger and Hamilton are the latest in a slew of celebrities to fall victim to hackers. Back in 2014, the iCloud accounts of Jennifer Lawrence, Kirsten Dunst and Kate Upton - just to name a few - were breached, and a number of their private photos were leaked online.