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BDSM practitioner Madelaine Thomas represents not at all your typical tech founder. After multiple occurrences of individuals distributing her private explicit images, she felt "angry enough to do something about it" and turned to technology for answers.

"Those were beautiful pictures, I'm unapologetic of the pictures, I'm embarrassed of the manner that they were weaponized by someone who I don't know," stated Madelaine.

Just over a year since founding her venture, Image Angel, which employs invisible forensic watermarking to identify abusers, has won several awards and was cited as best practice in an independent pornography review earlier this year.

This represents a significant shift from her previous career in providing BDSM services, dominating clients in the realms of kink and bondage.

The Pervasive Problem

The non-consensual sharing of private images, often referred to as image-based abuse, is a criminal offence with perpetrators facing up to two years in prison.

It is not at all an issue uniquely experienced by those in the sex industry. A study suggests that around 1.42% of the women in the UK is affected by intimate image abuse each year.

Madelaine, 37, said 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 expect?'," she said.

"I demand respect, I expect respect, and I expect confidence, and I don't see why those are negotiable," she added. "The reality that those images could be then shared where I live or with my loved ones and employed to cause them pain, that's beyond, that's not my choice, that's not my mistake, that's an individual being an abuser."

A Unique Journey

Madelaine has been working as a dominatrix, mainly online, for 10 years and always found her work liberating and satisfying. "I am as a woman in control, a woman who is confident and powerful, giving my body as a gift to someone because I wish to," she described.

"Some believe it's unusual but I don't see it any differently to a nutritionist or an financial advisor providing a service," she added.

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

She insisted she was not in the least bit techy and was managed to build her company after a lot of late nights, investigation and "bugging people" who know about tech.

How Does the Technology Work?

Image Angel can be implemented on any online platform where people exchange photos, for instance social connection apps, social networks and websites.

When an image is viewed by a viewer, it is automatically embedded with an undetectable digital marker which is specific to that viewer.

This covert marker is embedded into the digital file of the image itself and can withstand screenshots, being altered and being re-captured with a different camera.

It ensures that if you find out your image has been circulated without your consent, providing the platform you used has the technology embedded, 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 discussions with many others.

Proven Technology, New Application

"The system is already in use in Hollywood, it already exists in sports broadcasting so this is not brand new technology, it's just a novel use and a new system," said Madelaine.

"We have validated 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 preventive measure to potential intimate image abusers.

Changing the Narrative

An expert from a support service commented she had seen directly the trauma and guilt intimate image abuse caused for victims.

"When that guilt is reinforced by a uninformed acquaintance or professional who says 'what did you expect?' that guilt can really be reinforced so it's crucial that the support a victim receives is that they have not done anything wrong," she emphasized.

She added it was fantastic that Madelaine was using her experience to create solutions, saying: "It is really important to have this multi-layered approach towards tackling tech facilitated gender-based abuse, because a single solution is going to be able to solve this problem, no one helpline, it needs to be this multi-layered response."

TV presenter Jess Davies was just 15 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 youth that would later inform her women's rights campaigning.

"It took so long, an excessive amount of time for someone to tell me, 'you are not to blame' and 'that shouldn't have happened'," recalled Jess.

She too is passionate about removing the stigma of this crime from the victims to the offenders. "There is no offence to willingly share an photo to someone," said Jess.

"However, it is illegal to distribute that non-consensually and I think that should invariably be where the responsibility is," she concluded.