Mia Khalifa

Khalifa spoke out against the porn industry and the loss of privacy it caused her in a 2019 interview with BBC's HARDtalk.

Khalifa is a supporter of English Premier League club, West Ham United. Attending a Premier League game at the London Stadium in January 2019 between West Ham and Arsenal, her verbal abuse of Arsenal midfielder, Matteo Guendouzi, on social media for diving gained much publicity and redistribution on social media platforms.

Khalifa was announced to co-host SportsBall alongside Tyler Coe, with its second season premiering July 16, 2018, exclusively on RoosterTeeth. Its final episode was released on October 30, 2018.

In 2018, the musical duo iLoveFriday released a diss track called "Mia Khalifa", in response to a fake tweet posted by a user impersonating Khalifa. The song became an internet meme after the "hit or miss" snippet gained popularity on the TikTok app. It is the most well-known viral TikTok meme in the Western world, and has been used in over four million TikTok videos.

In January 2017, xHamster reported that Khalifa was the most searched-for adult actress of 2016. In 2018, three years after leaving the industry, she was still the second-highest ranked person on Pornhub. In August 2019, she revealed that she only made $12,000 working in porn, and had never received residuals from Pornhub or any other sites.

After leaving porn, Khalifa worked in Miami as a paralegal and bookkeeper. She transitioned into a career as a social media personality, webcam model and sports commentator. She runs a YouTube channel; live streams on Twitch; and performed as a webcam model; sells photoshoots, merchandise and access to exclusive content on membership website Patreon; and sold explicit photoshoots and videos on the social media website Findrow. She and Gilbert Arenas hosted Out of Bounds, a daily sports show on Complex News's YouTube channel, from October 2017 to February 2018.

In a July 2016 interview with The Washington Post, Khalifa stated that she had only performed in pornography for three months and had left the industry over a year before, changing to a "more normal job". She said "I guess it was my rebellious phase. It wasn't really for me. I kind of smartened up and tried to distance myself from that." As of May 2016, Khalifa was still performing as a webcam model.

In November 2016, an online petition called for Khalifa to be appointed by President-elect Donald Trump as the next United States Ambassador to Saudi Arabia.

According to data from Pornhub, from January 3 to 6, 2015, searches for Khalifa increased five-fold. Around a quarter of those searches came from Lebanon, with substantial searches also from nearby countries Syria and Jordan. Because of the hijab-related controversy, she was ranked No. 5 in a list of "The world's 10 most notorious porn stars" by British men's magazine Loaded in July 2016. Almaza, a Lebanese brewery, ran an advertisement showing a bottle of their beer next to Khalifa's signature glasses, with the slogan: "We are both rated 18+." In January 2015, pop band Timeflies released a song titled "Mia Khalifa" in homage to her.

In January 2015, Khalifa signed a long-term contract with Bang Bros' parent company which required her to perform in multiple films each month. However, two weeks later, Khalifa had a change of heart and resigned. The negative attention she received from her global attention prompted her to leave the industry: "It was an eye-opener for me. I don't want any of this, whether it's positive or negative—but all of it was negative. I didn't think too much into it about how my friends and family and relationships were suffering."

Khalifa entered the pornographic film industry in October 2014. She was walking in Miami when she was asked if she had ever considered appearing in pornographic films. She came to widespread attention after the release of a BangBros scene in which she wears a hijab during a threesome. The scene brought Khalifa instant popularity, as well as criticism from writers and religious figures. The scene's producer said "We weren't trying to exploit [Khalifa's ethnicity]. We wanted to embrace it. No one could have anticipated the negativity surrounding it." Alex Hawkins, Vice President of Marketing for xHamster, said "The outrage it caused in the Arab world ended up being a bit of a 'Streisand effect'. Suddenly, everyone was searching for her. The effort to censor her only made her more ubiquitous." With more than 1.5 million views, the 22-year-old Khalifa became the most searched-for performer on the adult video sharing website Pornhub. On December 28 that year, Pornhub revealed that she was the No. 1 ranked performer on their website.

She has a tattoo of the opening line of the Lebanese National Anthem, and another of the Lebanese Forces Cross. She got the latter in 2012 after a bombing in Lebanon, stating it was to "show solidarity with my father's political views." Both tattoos have come under the scrutiny of her detractors.

Khalifa married her high school boyfriend in February 2011. They separated in 2014 and divorced in 2016.

Born in Beirut, Lebanon, Khalifa moved to the United States in 2001. She began acting in pornography in October 2014, and by December was ranked the most viewed performer on the website Pornhub. Her career choice was met with controversy in the Middle East, especially for a video in which she performed sexual acts while wearing the Islamic hijab. After three months, Khalifa left the pornographic industry to pursue other interests.

Mia Khalifa (/m iː ə k ə ˈ l iː f ə / ; Arabic: ميا خليفة ‎, Lebanese Arabic pronunciation: [ˈmiːa xaˈliːfe] ; born February 10, 1993), also known as Mia Callista, is a Lebanese-American social media personality, sports commentator and webcam model. She was a pornographic actress from 2014 to 2015.

Mia Khalifa was born on February 10, 1993, in Beirut, Lebanon and moved with her family to the United States in January 2001, leaving their home in the wake of the South Lebanon conflict. Her family is Catholic and she was raised in that religion, in what she describes as a "very conservative" home, although she is no longer practicing. Khalifa attended a French private school in Beirut, where she learned to speak English. After moving to the United States, she lived in Montgomery County, Maryland and played lacrosse in high school. Khalifa attended Northwest High School. Khalifa has talked about being bullied at high school for being "the darkest and weirdest girl there", which intensified after the September 11 attacks.