🔗 Share this article

Professional dominatrix Madelaine Thomas is far from your typical tech founder. After repeated occurrences of individuals distributing her private explicit images, she felt "angry enough to take action" and turned to technology for a solution.

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

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

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

The Pervasive Problem

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 not at all an issue uniquely experienced by those in the sex industry. A study indicates that approximately 1.42% of the UK female population is impacted by this form of abuse on an annual basis.

Madelaine, thirty-seven, said survivors lived with shame and stigma. "I think a lot of people will comment, 'you shared a private image 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 up for debate," she continued. "The fact that those images could be then shared where I live or with my loved ones and used to hurt them, that's beyond, 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, mainly online, for 10 years and consistently found her work liberating and satisfying. "I am as a woman in control, a woman who is empowered and strong, offering 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 accountant giving advice," she added.

She welcomes being something of an anomaly in the world of tech. "I understand that it's bizarre, it's remarkable to think that an individual who was a dominatrix is now a creator of a tech company, but it required someone who has experienced it firsthand to know the loopholes and the changes that were necessary," she explained.

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

How Does the Technology Work?

Image Angel can be used by any online platform where people share images, for instance social connection apps, social media and online sites.

When an image is viewed by a user, it is seamlessly tagged 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 photographed with a different camera.

It ensures that if you find out your image has been shared 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 extracted by a forensic expert so action can be taken.

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

An Established Method for a New Purpose

"This technology is already in use in Hollywood, it is employed in live television so this is not brand new technology, it's just a novel use and a different framework," explained Madelaine.

"We have validated it, we're collaborating with a firm that has 30 years experience in tech development so we know that this is solid and what we now need to do is test it at scale," she added.

She expressed hope she believed the technology would also act as a deterrent to would-be perpetrators.

Removing Stigma, Shifting Blame

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

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

She added it was fantastic that Madelaine was using her experience to create solutions, adding: "It is really important to have this comprehensive strategy towards addressing 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 shared around her local community. 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 say to me, 'you are not to blame' and 'that shouldn't have happened'," said Jess.

She too is passionate about eliminating the shame of intimate image abuse from the victims to the perpetrators. "There is no offence to consensually send an photo to someone," stated Jess.

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