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Professional dominatrix Madelaine Thomas represents far from your standard tech founder. After repeated occurrences of clients leaking her private explicit images, she was "sufficiently outraged to do something about it" and looked to technology for a solution.

"Those were striking images, I'm not ashamed of the photographs, I'm ashamed of the way that they were used against me by an individual who I don't know," said Madelaine.

Just over a year since launching her company, Image Angel, which uses invisible forensic watermarking to track perpetrators, has garnered significant recognition and was recommended as best practice in an government-commissioned study recently.

This marks a significant shift from her previous career in providing consensual sexual encounters, working with clients in the world of BDSM.

A Widespread Issue

Intimate image abuse, often referred to as revenge porn, is a punishable crime with offenders facing up to two years in prison.

It is far from an issue exclusively faced by those in the sex industry. A study suggests that around 1.42% of the UK female population is affected by this form of abuse each year.

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

"I expect respect, I expect consideration, and I expect confidence, and I fail to understand why those are up for debate," she continued. "The fact that those images could be then shared in my community or with people I love and employed to cause them pain, that's beyond, that's not my choice, that's not an error on my part, that's someone being an abuser."

A Unique Journey

Madelaine has been working as a dominatrix, primarily online, for a decade and always found her work liberating and satisfying. "It's me as a dominant woman, a woman who is confident and powerful, offering my body as a gift to someone because I wish to," she described.

"Some believe it's strange but I don't see it any differently to a nutritionist or an accountant providing a service," she remarked.

She welcomes being something of an anomaly in the world of tech. "I understand that it's bizarre, it's crazy to think that an individual who was a dominatrix is now a founder of a technology firm, but it took someone who has experienced it firsthand to know the loopholes and the changes that needed to happen," she explained.

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

Understanding the Tech Solution

Image Angel can be implemented on any digital service where people exchange photos, for instance dating apps, social media and websites.

When an image is accessed by a user, it is automatically embedded with an undetectable digital marker which is specific to that viewer.

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 secondary device.

It ensures that if you discover your image has been shared non-consensually, as long as the platform you used has the technology embedded, 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 service has adopted 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 novel use and a different framework," said Madelaine.

"And we've tested it, we're collaborating with a company that has 30 years experience in developing technology 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 potential perpetrators.

Changing the Narrative

An expert from a support service commented she had seen directly 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 self blame can really be reinforced so it's really important that the support a victim receives is that they have committed no error," she emphasized.

She noted it was inspiring that Madelaine was using her experience to bring about change, adding: "It is vital to have this comprehensive strategy towards addressing 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 just 15 when photographs of her in a state of undress were circulated within her local community. It was the beginning of multiple violations Jess experienced in her youth that would later inform her advocacy work.

"It took so long, an excessive amount of time for someone to tell me, 'it wasn't your fault' and 'that was wrong'," said Jess.

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

"However, it is illegal to circulate that non-consensually and I think that should invariably be where the responsibility is," she affirmed.