🔗 Share this article From BDSM Practitioner to Tech Founder: A Unique Campaign Against Intimate Image Abuse Madelaine Thomas states her personal experience of experiencing her intimate images shared without consent gives her a distinct perspective as a technology entrepreneur. Professional dominatrix Madelaine Thomas represents not at all your standard startup entrepreneur. After repeated instances of clients distributing her private explicit images, she was "sufficiently outraged to do something about it" and turned to technology for answers. "Those were striking images, I'm not ashamed of the pictures, I'm embarrassed of the way that they were used against me by someone who I have never met," said Madelaine. Madelaine has won several awards such as the Tech Safety Innovation award at a prominent safety summit. Little over a year after founding her venture, Image Angel, which employs invisible forensic watermarking to track abusers, has won several awards and was cited as best practice in an independent pornography review recently. This marks a significant shift from her previous career in offering BDSM services, working with clients in the world of BDSM. The Pervasive Problem Intimate image abuse, commonly known as image-based abuse, is a criminal offence with perpetrators facing up to two years in prison. It is not at all an issue uniquely experienced by those in the adult entertainment sector. A study indicates that around 1.42% of the UK female population is impacted by this form of abuse on an annual basis. Madelaine, 37, said victims lived with shame and stigma. "I think a lot of people will say, 'you shared a private image out on the internet, what do you anticipate?'," she noted. "I expect respect, I expect respect, and I expect confidence, and I fail to understand why those are negotiable," she added. "The fact that those images could be then shared where I live or with people I love 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." Madelaine aims her technology will deter would-be individuals from sharing photos without consent. A Unique Journey Madelaine has been practicing as a professional dominatrix, mainly online, for a decade and consistently found her work empowering and fulfilling. "I am as a woman in control, a woman who is empowered and strong, offering my body as a treat to someone because I wish to," she described. "Some believe it's strange but I don't see it any differently to a personal trainer or an financial advisor providing a service," she remarked. 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 technology firm, but it took someone who has been through it to understand the flaws and the modifications that were necessary," she stated. She maintained she was not technically inclined and was able to build her company after a lot of late nights, research and "bugging people" who understand tech. Understanding the Tech Solution Image Angel can be implemented on any online platform where people share images, for instance dating apps, social networks and websites. When an image is accessed by a viewer, it is automatically embedded with an invisible forensic watermark which is unique to them. This invisible watermark is encoded within the digital file of the image itself and can survive screenshots, being edited and being re-captured with a different camera. It means that if you find out your image has been circulated without your consent, as long as the service you posted it on has the technology embedded, the sharer's information will be encoded in the image and can be retrieved by a data recovery specialist so legal steps can follow. To date, one service has implemented her tech and she's in talks with several more. An Established Method for a New Purpose "This technology is already in use in Hollywood, 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. "We have validated it, we're partnering with a company that has 30 years experience in tech development so we are confident that this is reliable and what we now need to do is deploy it widely," she continued. She expressed hope she believed the technology would also act as a preventive measure to potential perpetrators. Removing Stigma, Shifting Blame An expert from a support service commented she had seen directly the panic, distress and self-blame this abuse caused for victims. "If that self-blame is reinforced 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 reinforced 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 leveraging her ordeal to create solutions, saying: "It is really important to have this multi-layered approach towards tackling technology-enabled gender-based 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." Madelaine Thomas and TV presenter Jess Davies have been victims of experiencing their intimate images distributed without their consent. TV presenter Jess Davies was only fifteen when images of her in a state of undress were circulated within her town. 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, too long for someone to tell me, 'it wasn't your fault' and 'that was wrong'," recalled Jess. She too is dedicated to removing the stigma of this crime from the survivors to the perpetrators. "There is no offence to willingly share an image to someone," said Jess. "But it is a crime to distribute that non-consensually and I think that should invariably be where the blame is," she affirmed.