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BDSM practitioner Madelaine Thomas is not at all your average startup entrepreneur. Following multiple occurrences of clients leaking her intimate photographs, she felt "sufficiently outraged to do something about it" and turned to tech solutions for a solution.

"These were beautiful pictures, I'm unapologetic of the pictures, I'm embarrassed of the way that they were used against me by someone who I don't know," stated Madelaine.

Little over a year after launching her company, Image Angel, which uses invisible forensic watermarking to track perpetrators, has won several awards and was cited as best practice in an government-commissioned study recently.

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

The Pervasive Problem

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

It is far from an issue uniquely experienced by those in the adult entertainment sector. A report suggests that around 1.42% of the women in the UK is impacted by this form of abuse each year.

Madelaine, thirty-seven, explained victims endured feelings of humiliation. "I think a lot of people will comment, 'you put a saucy picture out on the internet, what do you anticipate?'," she said.

"I expect dignity, I expect consideration, and I expect trust, and I fail to understand why those are negotiable," she continued. "The reality that those images could be subsequently distributed where I live or with my loved ones and used to hurt them, that's beyond, that's not a decision I made, that's not an error on my part, that's someone being an abuser."

An Unconventional Path

Madelaine has been practicing as a professional dominatrix, mainly online, for 10 years and consistently found her work liberating and satisfying. "It's me as a woman in control, a woman who is empowered and strong, offering my body as a gift to someone of my own volition," she said.

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

She embraces being a unique figure in the world of tech. "I understand that it's bizarre, it's remarkable to think that someone 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 modifications that needed to happen," she explained.

She maintained she was not technically inclined and was able 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 online sites.

When an image is viewed by a viewer, it is seamlessly tagged with an undetectable digital marker which is unique to them.

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, providing the service you posted it on has the technology embedded, the viewer's details will be encoded in the image and can be extracted by a forensic expert so legal steps can follow.

Currently, one platform has implemented her tech and she's in discussions with several more.

An Established Method for a New Purpose

"The system is already in use in Hollywood, it already exists in live television so this is not an untested concept, it's just a novel use and a new system," said Madelaine.

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

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

Changing the Narrative

An advocate from a leading helpline commented she had seen directly the panic, distress and self-blame this abuse inflicted on victims.

"If that self-blame is compounded by a uninformed acquaintance or professional who says 'well, why did you take those images in the first place?' that self blame can really be deepened so it's crucial that the response a victim receives is that they have not done anything wrong," she stated.

She noted it was fantastic that Madelaine was using her experience to bring about change, saying: "It is really important to have this comprehensive strategy towards tackling tech facilitated abuse, because no one tool is going to be able to solve this problem, no one helpline, it needs to be this integrated effort."

TV presenter Jess Davies was only fifteen 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 teens and 20s 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 survivors to the perpetrators. "There is no offence to consensually send an photo to someone," stated Jess.

"But it is a crime to circulate that non-consensually and I think that should always be where the responsibility is," she concluded.