🔗 Share this article

BDSM practitioner Madelaine Thomas embodies not at all your standard startup entrepreneur. After multiple instances of clients leaking her intimate photographs, she was "angry enough to do something about it" and turned to tech solutions for answers.

"Those were beautiful pictures, I'm not ashamed of the pictures, I'm embarrassed of the way that they were weaponized by someone 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 won several awards and was recommended as exemplary procedure in an government-commissioned study recently.

This marks quite a departure from her previous career in providing BDSM services, working with clients in the world of BDSM.

A Widespread Issue

Intimate image abuse, often referred to as revenge porn, is a criminal offence with perpetrators facing up to two years in prison.

It is far from an issue uniquely experienced by those in the sex industry. A report suggests that approximately 1.42% of the women in the UK is impacted by this form of abuse on an annual basis.

Madelaine, thirty-seven, said victims endured shame and stigma. "In my view a lot of people will say, 'you shared a private image out on the internet, what do you expect?'," she said.

"I demand dignity, I expect respect, and I expect confidence, and I fail to understand why those are up for debate," 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 unacceptable, that's not a decision I made, that's not an error on my part, that's an individual committing abuse."

An Unconventional Path

Madelaine has been practicing as a dominatrix, mainly online, for 10 years and always found her work liberating and satisfying. "It's me as a dominant woman, 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 strange but I view it similarly to a nutritionist or an financial advisor providing a service," she remarked.

She welcomes being something of an anomaly in the technology sector. "I understand that it's bizarre, it's crazy to think that someone who was a dominatrix is now a creator of a tech company, but it took someone who has been through it to know the loopholes and the modifications that were necessary," she explained.

She insisted she was not technically inclined and was managed to build her company after a lot of sleepless nights, investigation and "bugging people" who know about tech.

How Does the Technology Work?

Image Angel can be used by any digital service where people exchange photos, for instance social connection apps, social networks and websites.

When an image is accessed by a viewer, it is automatically embedded with an invisible forensic watermark which is specific to that viewer.

This covert marker is embedded into the digital file of the image itself and can survive screenshots, being altered and being photographed with a different camera.

It means that if you find out your image has been circulated non-consensually, providing the service you posted it on has the system integrated, the viewer's details will be hidden within the image and can be retrieved by a data recovery specialist so action can be taken.

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

Proven Technology, New Application

"The system 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 new system," said Madelaine.

"We have validated it, we're collaborating with a firm 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 continued.

She said she believed the technology would also act as a preventive measure to would-be intimate image abusers.

Changing the Narrative

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

"When that guilt is reinforced by a uninformed acquaintance or service who says 'what did you expect?' that self blame can really be deepened so it's really important that the support 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 multi-layered approach 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 her underwear were circulated within her town. It was the first of several incidents Jess endured in her teens and 20s that would later shape her advocacy work.

"It took so long, too long for someone to say to me, 'you are not to blame' and 'that shouldn't have happened'," said Jess.

She too is dedicated to 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 without consent and I think that should invariably be where the blame is," she concluded.