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Professional dominatrix Madelaine Thomas embodies not at all your standard tech founder. Following multiple instances of individuals distributing her private explicit images, she felt "sufficiently outraged to do something about it" and looked to technology for answers.

"Those were beautiful pictures, I'm not ashamed of the photographs, I'm embarrassed of the way that they were weaponized by an individual who I don't know," said Madelaine.

Little over a year since founding her venture, Image Angel, which uses covert digital tracking to identify abusers, has garnered significant recognition and was recommended as best practice in an government-commissioned study recently.

This marks quite a departure from her previous career in providing consensual sexual encounters, working with clients in the realms of kink and bondage.

The Pervasive Problem

Intimate image abuse, commonly known as revenge porn, is a punishable crime with offenders risking two years in prison.

It is not at all an issue exclusively faced by those in the adult entertainment sector. A study indicates that around 1.42% of the UK female population is impacted by intimate image abuse each year.

Madelaine, 37, explained victims endured shame and stigma. "I think a lot of people will say, 'you shared a saucy picture out on the internet, what do you expect?'," she noted.

"I expect respect, I expect respect, and I expect trust, and I don't see why those are negotiable," 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 beyond, that's not my choice, that's not an error on my part, that's an individual being an abuser."

A Unique Journey

Madelaine has been practicing as a professional dominatrix, mainly online, for a decade and consistently found her work liberating and satisfying. "It's me as a dominant woman, a woman who is confident and powerful, offering my body as a gift to someone because I wish to," she described.

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

She embraces 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 creator of a technology firm, but it required someone who has been through it to know the loopholes and the modifications that were necessary," she stated.

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

How Does the Technology Work?

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

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

This invisible watermark is embedded into the digital file of the image itself and can survive screen shots, being edited and being photographed 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 sharer's information will be encoded in the image and can be extracted by a forensic expert so legal steps can follow.

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

Proven Technology, New Application

"The system already exists in the film industry, it already exists in sports broadcasting so this is not an untested concept, it's just a new application and a new system," said Madelaine.

"And we've tested it, we're collaborating with a firm that has 30 years experience in tech development so we are confident that this is solid and what we now need to do is test it at scale," she added.

She said she hoped the technology would also act as a deterrent to would-be perpetrators.

Changing the Narrative

An expert from a leading helpline commented she had seen directly the panic, distress and self-blame intimate image abuse caused for victims.

"When that guilt is compounded by a uninformed acquaintance or service 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 response somebody is provided with is that they have not done anything wrong," she stated.

She added it was inspiring that Madelaine was using her experience to bring about change, 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 her underwear were shared around her town. It was the beginning of multiple violations Jess endured in her youth that would later shape her women's rights campaigning.

"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 passionate about eliminating the shame of intimate image abuse from the survivors to the offenders. "It isn't a crime to willingly share an photo to someone," stated Jess.

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