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Professional dominatrix Madelaine Thomas is far from your typical startup entrepreneur. After multiple instances of clients distributing her intimate photographs, she was "angry enough to do something about it" and turned to tech solutions for answers.

"These were beautiful pictures, I'm unapologetic of the photographs, I'm ashamed of the way that they were weaponized by an individual who I don't know," said 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 recently.

This represents quite a departure from her background in providing consensual sexual encounters, dominating clients in the realms of kink and bondage.

A Widespread Issue

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

It is not at all an issue exclusively faced by those in the sex industry. A report indicates that approximately 1.42% of the women in the UK is impacted by this form of abuse on an annual basis.

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

"I expect dignity, I expect respect, and I expect trust, and I fail to understand why those are up for debate," she added. "The reality that those images could be subsequently distributed in my community or with my loved ones and employed to cause them pain, that's unacceptable, that's not my choice, that's not an error on my part, that's someone being an abuser."

A Unique Journey

Madelaine has been practicing as a professional dominatrix, mainly online, for a decade and consistently found her work empowering and fulfilling. "It's me as a woman in control, a woman who is confident and powerful, offering my body as a treat to someone of my own volition," she said.

"Some believe it's strange but I view it similarly to a personal trainer or an financial advisor providing a service," she added.

She welcomes being a unique figure in the technology sector. "I understand that it's unconventional, it's remarkable to think that an individual who was a dominatrix is now a founder of a technology firm, but it required someone who has been through it to understand the loopholes and the changes that were necessary," she explained.

She maintained she was not technically inclined and was managed to build her company after many sleepless nights, investigation and "consulting experts" who know about tech.

Understanding the Tech Solution

Image Angel can be implemented on any digital service where people share images, for instance social connection apps, social networks and online sites.

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 encoded within the copy of the image itself and can survive screen shots, being altered and being re-captured with a secondary device.

It means that if you discover your image has been shared without your consent, as long as the service you posted it on has the system integrated, the viewer's details will be encoded in the image and can be retrieved by a data recovery specialist so action can be taken.

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

An Established Method for a New Purpose

"This technology already exists in the film industry, it already exists in sports broadcasting so this is not an untested concept, it's just a novel use and a different framework," explained Madelaine.

"And we've tested it, we're collaborating with a firm that has decades of expertise in tech development 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 perpetrators.

Changing the Narrative

An expert from a support service commented she had seen first-hand the panic, distress and self-blame intimate image abuse inflicted on victims.

"When that guilt is compounded by a misinformed friend or service who says 'what did you expect?' that guilt can really be deepened so it's crucial that the response a victim receives is that they have not done anything wrong," she emphasized.

She noted it was fantastic that Madelaine was leveraging her ordeal to create solutions, saying: "It is vital to have this comprehensive strategy towards tackling technology-enabled abuse, because a single solution is going to be able to tackle this alone, no one helpline, it needs to be this integrated effort."

TV presenter Jess Davies was just 15 when images of her in a state of undress were shared around her local community. It was the first of several incidents Jess endured in her youth that would later shape her advocacy work.

"It took so long, an excessive amount of time for someone to tell me, 'it wasn't your fault' and 'that was wrong'," recalled Jess.

She too is dedicated to eliminating the shame of intimate image abuse from the victims to the offenders. "It isn't a crime to willingly share an photo to someone," stated Jess.

"However, it is illegal to distribute that without consent and I think that should invariably be where the blame is," she concluded.