🔗 Share this article

Professional dominatrix Madelaine Thomas represents not at all your average tech founder. After repeated instances of individuals distributing her private explicit images, she felt "sufficiently outraged to do something about it" and looked to tech solutions for answers.

"Those were beautiful pictures, I'm unapologetic of the pictures, I'm ashamed of the way that they were weaponized by someone who I have never met," explained Madelaine.

Little over a year after founding her venture, Image Angel, which employs covert digital tracking to track abusers, has won several awards and was cited as best practice in an independent pornography review earlier this year.

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

The Pervasive Problem

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

It is far from an issue exclusively faced by those in the adult entertainment sector. A study suggests that around 1.42% of the women in the UK is affected by this form of abuse on an annual basis.

Madelaine, thirty-seven, said victims lived with feelings of humiliation. "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 demand dignity, I expect consideration, and I expect confidence, and I don't see why those are up for debate," she added. "The fact that those images could be then shared where I live 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 working as a dominatrix, mainly online, for 10 years and consistently found her work liberating and satisfying. "I am as a dominant woman, a woman who is empowered and strong, giving my body as a gift to someone of my own volition," she described.

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

She embraces being something of an anomaly in the world of tech. "I know that it's bizarre, it's crazy to think that someone who was a dominatrix is now a creator of a technology firm, but it required someone who has been through it to know the flaws and the changes that needed to happen," she explained.

She insisted she was not in the least bit techy and was able to build her company after many late nights, research and "consulting experts" who understand tech.

Understanding the Tech Solution

Image Angel can be used by any digital service 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 specific to that viewer.

This invisible watermark is encoded within the digital file of the image itself and can withstand screenshots, being edited and being re-captured with a different camera.

It means that if you discover your image has been circulated non-consensually, as long as the platform you posted it on has the technology embedded, the sharer's information will be hidden within the image and can be extracted by a forensic expert so action can be taken.

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

An Established Method for a New Purpose

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

"And we've tested it, we're partnering with a firm that has decades of expertise 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 said she believed the technology would also act as a deterrent to would-be perpetrators.

Changing the Narrative

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

"When that guilt is reinforced by a misinformed friend or professional who says 'well, why did you take those images in the first place?' that guilt can really be reinforced so it's really important that the support somebody is provided with is that they have committed no error," she stated.

She added it was inspiring that Madelaine was leveraging her ordeal to bring about change, adding: "It is really important to have this multi-layered approach towards tackling tech facilitated abuse, because no one tool is going to be able to tackle this alone, not just support services, it needs to be this integrated effort."

TV presenter Jess Davies was only fifteen when photographs of her in her underwear were shared around her local community. It was the first of several incidents Jess experienced in her teens and 20s that would later inform her advocacy work.

"It took so long, an excessive amount of time for someone to tell me, 'you are not to blame' and 'that was wrong'," recalled Jess.

She too is passionate about removing the stigma of intimate image abuse from the survivors to the perpetrators. "It isn't a crime to consensually send an photo to someone," stated Jess.

"However, it is illegal to distribute that non-consensually and I think that should always be where the responsibility is," she concluded.