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BDSM practitioner Madelaine Thomas is not at all your typical tech founder. After multiple occurrences of clients leaking her intimate photographs, she was "angry enough to do something about it" and turned to tech solutions for a solution.

"These were striking images, I'm not ashamed of the pictures, I'm ashamed of the manner that they were weaponized by an individual who I have never met," explained Madelaine.

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

This represents quite a departure from her background in providing BDSM services, dominating clients in the world of BDSM.

A Widespread Issue

The non-consensual sharing of private images, commonly known as image-based abuse, is a punishable crime with perpetrators facing up to two years in prison.

It is far from an issue exclusively faced by those in the adult entertainment sector. A study suggests that approximately 1.42% of the women in the UK is impacted by intimate image abuse each year.

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

"I expect dignity, I expect respect, and I expect trust, and I fail to understand why those are negotiable," she added. "The reality that those images could be subsequently distributed where I live 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 an individual committing abuse."

An Unconventional Path

Madelaine has been practicing as a professional dominatrix, primarily online, for 10 years and always found her work empowering and fulfilling. "I am as a woman in control, a woman who is empowered and strong, giving my body as a gift to someone because I wish to," she said.

"Some believe it's strange but I don't see it any differently to a personal trainer or an accountant giving advice," she added.

She welcomes being something of an anomaly in the world of tech. "I understand that it's unconventional, 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 been through it to know the loopholes and the modifications that needed to happen," she explained.

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

Understanding the Tech Solution

Image Angel can be used by any online platform where people exchange photos, for instance dating apps, social media and online sites.

When an image is accessed by a user, it is seamlessly tagged with an invisible forensic watermark which is specific to that viewer.

This invisible watermark is encoded within the copy of the image itself and can withstand screen shots, being altered and being re-captured with a secondary device.

It means that if you find out your image has been circulated non-consensually, as long as the platform you posted it on has the system integrated, the viewer's details will be hidden within the image and can be retrieved by a data recovery specialist so action can be taken.

Currently, one platform 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 live television so this is not an untested concept, it's just a new application and a different framework," explained Madelaine.

"We have validated it, we're partnering with a firm that has decades of expertise 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 expressed hope she hoped the technology would also act as a deterrent to potential perpetrators.

Changing the Narrative

An advocate from a support service said she had seen first-hand the trauma and guilt this abuse inflicted on victims.

"When that guilt is reinforced by a uninformed acquaintance or professional who says 'well, why did you take those images in the first place?' that guilt can really be deepened so it's crucial that the support a victim receives is that they have committed no error," she emphasized.

She noted it was fantastic that Madelaine was using her experience to bring about change, saying: "It is really important to have this multi-layered approach towards addressing 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 only fifteen when images of her in her underwear were circulated within her local community. It was the first of several incidents Jess endured in her teens and 20s that would later inform her advocacy work.

"It required years, an excessive amount of time for someone to say to me, 'you are not to blame' and 'that was wrong'," said Jess.

She too is passionate about removing the stigma of intimate image abuse from the victims to the perpetrators. "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 always be where the responsibility is," she affirmed.