A 36-year-old pharmacist and father-of-one has been exposed as the mastermind behind the world’s biggest fake sex sites, according to a new documentary.
David Do, who portrayed himself as a loving family man and pillar of his Toronto community, was revealed after a years-long investigation by veteran tech reporter Laurie Segall, in a series presented by hotel heiress Paris Hilton.
Mr. Deepfakes – the site he owned and operated – invited users to create non-consensual deepfakes using pictures of celebrities, friends, family, acquaintances or just random pictures taken from the internet.
The site, where its height has more than 17 million users per month, operates in a legal environment – without accountability and consequences, but with thousands of completely unexpected victims.
When Segall revealed the identity of Mr. Deepfakes, he was shocked to discover the identity of his neighbor’s father – a well-liked neighbor who lived the same life as a community pharmacist.
“Offline, you couldn’t find a bad word about him. We found an Instagram post of him working in a hospital during COVID,” Segall told The Post.
But the father of one, who lived in a modest house in a beautiful neighborhood and drove the family car, did not turn away when Segall confronted him.
“I was scared because it wasn’t that he wasn’t afraid,” he recalled. “It was like ‘how are you going to get here’.”
“The reason why I started doing this issue is that [what Do did] they can turn little boys into someone who thinks it’s okay to digitally undress someone,” Segall said, referring to a website that allowed anyone to create fake — shareable — pornography with just someone’s image.
I remember looking at this and thinking how on earth it was allowed to exist.
“I talk to victims who want to kill themselves,” he added.
Last week, Segall presented his 14-part investigation into TikTok alongside Paris Hilton, who said she joined the effort to expose Do, because, “this could happen to anyone.”
The investigation also hit close to home for Hilton, who reportedly has more than 100,000 deep dives of herself online.
When Hilton was 19, an intimate video of her was shared without her consent.
“There were no laws to protect me,” said Hilton. “If I was able to do it so that other girls don’t have to face the problems I went through, that makes sense to me.
“It was like being digitally raped and the whole country was watching, and laughing […] It’s something I’ll have to live with for the rest of my life.”
The investigation began in 2022 after Segall, a former CNN technology reporter, received a tip about the site on social media.
A reporter found an online community creating and sharing AI-generated virtual reality sex videos featuring women without their consent.
What bothered him the most was not just the content itself – it was the discussion forums around it.
Users openly discussed creating fake videos of women they knew personally, including relatives, co-workers and acquaintances.
Segall noted that some users’ dreams hit disturbingly close to home, including one commenter who said: “Isn’t it right that I want to fuck my sister-in-law.”
Convinced that someone needs to be held accountable, Segall launches a digital manhunt.
He enlisted cyber security expert David Kennedy – whom he described as one of the country’s top coders – and his team of “hackers” to help track down the unknown operator.
Kennedy said his investigators used open-source intelligence techniques, tracing various Internet traces and digital footprints left across the web.
Along the way, a number of women have come forward saying that they have been victims of serious abuse.
One of the victims featured in the series was Los Angeles resident Joanne Chew, who was horrified after searching for her name online and finding vivid AI-generated videos of her face.
Chew said the incident broke the common misconception that only celebrities are targeted and left him feeling disowned by his image and identity.
The pair also highlighted Molly Kelley, who discovered that her husband’s best friend allegedly used AI tools to create non-graphic content involving her and several other women in his life.
“The technology is there for me to be able to do things that I wouldn’t do online and do sexual acts that I’ve never done before,” said Kelley.
As Segall’s investigation progressed, an unexpected tip came from a small anti-deepfake group in the Netherlands.
The tip led Segall to Dutch researcher Jordy Ubanski, whose team had spent months following the digital scraps across platforms, usernames, email addresses and archived posts.
According to the investigation, he believes that those breadcrumbs eventually pointed to a Canadian chemist named David Do.
The series chronicles Segall’s subsequent trip to Canada, where he and his team attempted to contact Do at multiple locations, including addresses linked to him and later at a hospital where public records show he worked.
“We have strong evidence that you are following Mr. Deepfakes. We have been trying to get in touch,” he told Do, who declined to comment.
Meanwhile, Kennedy said his team had produced a lot of evidence to support the identification.
A cybersecurity expert said that Do matched the digital footprint (from the 8chan post) “in every way, shape or form” and that they have many independent ways to strengthen it.
Segall said the issue goes beyond a single website, adding that parenthood has strengthened her and that Hilton’s fear of AI advances is more than a defense designed to reinforce it.
The investigation has come under increasing pressure from journalists, lawmakers, technology companies and lawyers.
According to Segall, Mr. Deepfakes shut down in 2025 after seven years on the internet and billions of views.
Hilton has continued to seek legislation aimed at protecting victims of AI-generated harm, including advocating for the DEFIANCE Act.
The long series impressed viewers, many of whom filled the comments section of the reality star with praise.
But for Segall his hope is to hold creators accountable — and to prevent young boys from thinking deepfake porn is just a game.
“Maybe this was a guy who was just into AI and technology and just had a weird sexuality and didn’t understand the depth of what he was doing,” Segall said of his collaboration with Do.
“Did you understand the damage? I wanted to ask him.”
But to this day, father-of-one Do refuses to answer any of these allegations.
