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Professional dominatrix Madelaine Thomas embodies not at all your typical startup entrepreneur. After repeated instances of individuals leaking her intimate photographs, she felt "sufficiently outraged to take action" and turned to tech solutions for answers.

"Those were beautiful pictures, I'm not ashamed of the pictures, I'm ashamed of the manner that they were used against me by someone who I don't know," stated Madelaine.

Just over a year after founding her company, Image Angel, which employs covert digital tracking to identify perpetrators, has garnered significant recognition and was recommended 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 realms of kink and bondage.

The Pervasive Problem

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

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

Madelaine, thirty-seven, said survivors endured shame and stigma. "I think a lot of people will comment, 'you put a saucy picture out on the internet, what do you expect?'," she said.

"I expect respect, I expect consideration, and I expect trust, and I don't see why those are negotiable," she continued. "The reality that those images could be subsequently distributed in my community or with people I love and used to hurt them, that's beyond, that's not my choice, that's not an error on my part, that's someone being an abuser."

An Unconventional Path

Madelaine has been practicing as a dominatrix, mainly online, for a decade and always found her work empowering and fulfilling. "It's me 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 said.

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

She welcomes being something of an anomaly in the technology sector. "I understand that it's bizarre, it's remarkable to think that someone who was a dominatrix is now a creator of a technology firm, but it required someone who has experienced it firsthand to understand the loopholes and the changes that needed to happen," she explained.

She maintained she was not technically inclined and was managed 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 share images, for instance social connection apps, social media and online sites.

When an image is viewed by a viewer, it is seamlessly tagged with an invisible forensic watermark which is unique to them.

This invisible watermark is embedded into the digital file of the image itself and can survive screen shots, being altered and being re-captured with a different camera.

It ensures that if you find out your image has been shared without your consent, 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 forensic expert so action can be taken.

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

An Established Method for a New Purpose

"The system is already in use 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 different framework," explained Madelaine.

"And we've tested it, we're partnering with a company that has 30 years experience in tech development so we are confident that this is solid and what we now need to do is deploy it widely," she added.

She expressed hope she hoped the technology would also act as a preventive measure to potential intimate image abusers.

Removing Stigma, Shifting Blame

An expert 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 compounded by a misinformed friend or service who says 'what did you expect?' that self blame can really be reinforced 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 leveraging her ordeal to bring about change, saying: "It is really important to have this multi-layered approach towards tackling technology-enabled abuse, because no one tool 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 just 15 when images of her in her underwear were circulated within 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 tell me, 'it wasn't your fault' and 'that shouldn't have happened'," said Jess.

She too is passionate about removing the stigma of this crime from the victims to the perpetrators. "There is no offence to willingly share an image to someone," stated Jess.

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