🔗 Share this article

BDSM practitioner Madelaine Thomas embodies far from your average tech founder. After multiple instances of clients distributing her intimate photographs, she was "sufficiently outraged to take action" and turned to technology for answers.

"Those were beautiful pictures, I'm not ashamed of the photographs, I'm ashamed of the way that they were used against me by someone who I have never met," stated Madelaine.

Little over a year since launching her company, Image Angel, which employs covert digital tracking to identify perpetrators, has won several awards and was recommended as exemplary procedure in an government-commissioned study earlier this year.

This represents quite a departure from her previous career in providing consensual sexual encounters, working with clients in the world of BDSM.

The Pervasive Problem

Intimate image abuse, often referred to as image-based abuse, is a criminal offence with offenders facing up to two years in prison.

It is far from an issue uniquely experienced by those in the sex industry. A report indicates that around 1.42% of the women in the UK is impacted by intimate image abuse each year.

Madelaine, thirty-seven, explained victims lived with feelings of humiliation. "I think a lot of people will comment, 'you shared a private image out on the internet, what do you expect?'," she noted.

"I demand dignity, I expect consideration, and I expect trust, and I don't see why those are negotiable," she continued. "The reality that those images could be subsequently distributed where I live or with my loved ones and used to hurt them, that's beyond, that's not my choice, that's not an error on my part, that's someone committing abuse."

An Unconventional Path

Madelaine has been practicing as a professional dominatrix, primarily online, for a decade and consistently found her work empowering and fulfilling. "It's me as a dominant woman, a woman who is empowered and strong, giving my body as a treat to someone because I wish to," she described.

"People think it's strange but I don't see it any differently to a nutritionist or an accountant giving advice," she remarked.

She embraces being something of an anomaly in the world of tech. "I know that it's bizarre, it's crazy to think that someone who was a dominatrix is now a founder of a tech company, but it took someone who has been through it to know the flaws and the modifications that needed to happen," she explained.

She insisted she was not technically inclined and was able to build her company after a lot of late nights, research and "bugging people" who understand tech.

How Does the Technology Work?

Image Angel can be implemented on any online platform where people share images, for instance dating apps, social media and websites.

When an image is viewed by a user, it is seamlessly tagged with an invisible forensic watermark which is unique to them.

This invisible watermark is encoded within the copy of the image itself and can withstand screenshots, being altered and being re-captured with a different camera.

It ensures that if you discover your image has been shared non-consensually, providing the platform you used has the system integrated, the sharer's information will be hidden within the image and can be retrieved by a forensic expert so action can be taken.

Currently, one platform has adopted her tech and she's in talks with many others.

An Established Method for a New Purpose

"This technology is already in use in Hollywood, it already exists in sports broadcasting so this is not an untested concept, it's just a new application and a new system," explained Madelaine.

"We have validated it, we're collaborating with a company that has 30 years experience in tech development so we are confident that this is reliable and what we now need to do is test it at scale," she continued.

She said she hoped the technology would also act as a preventive measure to potential intimate image abusers.

Changing the Narrative

An advocate from a support service said she had seen first-hand the panic, distress and self-blame intimate image abuse caused for victims.

"If that self-blame is compounded by a misinformed friend or professional who says 'well, why did you take those images in the first place?' that guilt can really be deepened so it's really important that the support somebody is provided with is that they have not done anything wrong," she stated.

She noted it was inspiring that Madelaine was leveraging her ordeal to bring about change, saying: "It is really important to have this multi-layered approach towards tackling tech facilitated gender-based abuse, because no one tool is going to be able to solve this problem, not just support services, it needs to be this multi-layered response."

TV presenter Jess Davies was only fifteen when images of her in a state of undress were circulated within her town. It was the beginning of multiple violations Jess endured in her teens and 20s that would later inform her women's rights campaigning.

"It took so long, too long for someone to say to me, 'it wasn't your fault' and 'that was wrong'," said Jess.

She too is dedicated to removing the stigma of intimate image abuse from the survivors to the perpetrators. "It isn't a crime to willingly share an image to someone," stated Jess.

"However, it is illegal to circulate that without consent and I think that should always be where the blame is," she affirmed.