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BDSM practitioner Madelaine Thomas embodies not at all your typical tech founder. After repeated occurrences of individuals distributing her private explicit images, she was "angry enough to do something about it" and turned to tech solutions for a solution.

"These were beautiful pictures, I'm not ashamed of the pictures, I'm ashamed of the manner that they were used against me by someone who I have never met," said Madelaine.

Just over a year after founding her company, Image Angel, which employs invisible forensic watermarking to track perpetrators, has garnered significant recognition and was recommended as exemplary procedure in an government-commissioned study recently.

This marks quite a departure from her background in providing BDSM services, working with clients in the realms of kink and bondage.

A Widespread Issue

Intimate image abuse, often referred to as revenge porn, 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 study indicates that around 1.42% of the UK female population is affected by this form of abuse on an annual basis.

Madelaine, 37, explained victims lived with shame and stigma. "In my view a lot of people will comment, 'you shared a saucy picture out on the internet, what do you anticipate?'," she noted.

"I expect dignity, I expect consideration, and I expect confidence, and I don't see why those are up for debate," she added. "The fact that those images could be then shared in my community or with my loved ones and used to hurt them, that's unacceptable, 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 dominatrix, primarily online, for 10 years and consistently found her work empowering and fulfilling. "It's me as a woman in control, a woman who is empowered and strong, offering my body as a gift to someone of my own volition," she described.

"People think it's unusual but I view it similarly to a personal trainer or an accountant giving advice," she added.

She embraces being something of an anomaly in the technology sector. "I know that it's bizarre, it's crazy to think that an individual who was a dominatrix is now a creator of a tech company, but it took someone who has experienced it firsthand to understand the loopholes and the modifications that needed to happen," she stated.

She insisted she was not technically inclined and was managed to build her company after many late nights, research and "bugging people" who know about tech.

Understanding the Tech Solution

Image Angel can be used by any digital service where people exchange photos, for instance social connection apps, social media and websites.

When an image is accessed by a viewer, it is automatically embedded with an invisible forensic watermark which is unique to them.

This covert marker is embedded into the digital file of the image itself and can survive screenshots, being altered and being photographed with a secondary device.

It means that if you discover your image has been shared non-consensually, as long as the service you posted it on has the system integrated, the sharer's information will be hidden within the image and can be retrieved by a forensic expert so legal steps can follow.

To date, one platform has implemented her tech and she's in discussions with many others.

Proven Technology, New Application

"This technology is already in use in the film industry, it already exists in live television so this is not brand new technology, it's just a novel use and a different framework," said Madelaine.

"And we've tested it, we're partnering with a company that has decades of expertise in developing technology so we know that this is reliable and what we now need to do is test it at scale," she continued.

She said she believed the technology would also act as a deterrent to would-be intimate image abusers.

Changing the Narrative

An advocate from a support service commented she had seen first-hand the trauma and guilt this abuse caused for victims.

"If that self-blame is reinforced by a uninformed acquaintance or professional who says 'what did you expect?' that self blame can really be reinforced so it's really important that the response somebody is provided with is that they have not done anything wrong," she emphasized.

She noted it was inspiring that Madelaine was leveraging her ordeal to bring about change, saying: "It is vital to have this multi-layered approach towards tackling tech facilitated gender-based abuse, because a single solution is going to be able to tackle this alone, not just support services, it needs to be this multi-layered response."

TV presenter Jess Davies was only fifteen when images of her in her underwear were circulated within her town. It was the beginning of multiple violations Jess experienced in her youth that would later inform her women's rights campaigning.

"It required years, too long for someone to tell me, 'you are not to blame' and 'that was wrong'," said Jess.

She too is dedicated to removing the stigma of this crime from the victims to the perpetrators. "It isn't a crime to consensually send an photo to someone," said Jess.

"But it is a crime to distribute that without consent and I think that should invariably be where the responsibility is," she affirmed.