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BDSM practitioner Madelaine Thomas represents not at all your average startup entrepreneur. Following multiple instances of clients distributing her private explicit images, she felt "sufficiently outraged to take action" and turned to tech solutions for answers.

"These were striking images, I'm unapologetic of the pictures, I'm embarrassed of the way that they were used against me by an individual who I have never met," said Madelaine.

Little over a year since founding her company, Image Angel, which employs invisible forensic watermarking to track perpetrators, has garnered significant recognition and was recommended as best practice in an government-commissioned study earlier this year.

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

A Widespread Issue

The non-consensual sharing of private images, often referred to as image-based abuse, is a punishable crime with offenders facing up to two years in prison.

It is not at all an issue uniquely experienced by those in the sex industry. A report suggests that approximately 1.42% of the women in the UK is affected by this form of abuse on an annual basis.

Madelaine, thirty-seven, explained victims lived with shame and stigma. "I think a lot of people will say, 'you put a private image out on the internet, what do you anticipate?'," she noted.

"I expect dignity, I expect respect, and I expect trust, and I don't see why those are up for debate," she continued. "The reality that those images could be subsequently distributed where I live or with people I love and employed to cause them pain, that's unacceptable, that's not my choice, that's not an error on my part, that's an individual being an abuser."

An Unconventional Path

Madelaine has been working as a professional dominatrix, mainly online, for a decade and consistently found her work liberating and satisfying. "It's me as a dominant woman, a woman who is empowered and strong, giving my body as a gift to someone because I wish to," she said.

"People think it's unusual but I view it similarly to a nutritionist or an accountant providing a service," she added.

She welcomes being something of an anomaly in the world of tech. "I understand that it's unconventional, it's crazy to think that someone who was a dominatrix is now a founder of a tech company, but it required someone who has experienced it firsthand to know the flaws and the changes that were necessary," she stated.

She insisted she was not technically inclined and was managed to build her company after a lot of sleepless nights, research and "consulting experts" who understand tech.

Understanding the Tech Solution

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

When an image is accessed by a user, it is seamlessly tagged with an undetectable digital marker which is unique to them.

This covert marker is encoded within the digital file of the image itself and can withstand screen shots, being altered and being photographed with a different camera.

It means that if you find out your image has been shared without your consent, providing the service you used has the technology embedded, the viewer's details will be encoded in the image and can be extracted by a data recovery specialist so legal steps can follow.

To date, one service has adopted her tech and she's in talks with several more.

Proven Technology, New Application

"This technology already exists in Hollywood, it is employed in live television so this is not brand new technology, it's just a new application and a different framework," said Madelaine.

"We have validated it, we're collaborating with a firm that has decades of expertise in developing technology so we are confident that this is solid and what we now need to do is deploy it widely," she added.

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

Changing the Narrative

An advocate from a leading helpline commented she had seen first-hand the panic, distress and self-blame intimate image abuse caused for victims.

"If that self-blame is reinforced by a misinformed friend or service who says 'well, why did you take those images in the first place?' that self blame can really be deepened so it's really important that the response somebody is provided with is that they have committed no error," she emphasized.

She added it was inspiring 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 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 shared around her town. It was the beginning of multiple violations Jess endured in her teens and 20s 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 shouldn't have happened'," recalled Jess.

She too is dedicated to removing the stigma of intimate image abuse from the survivors to the perpetrators. "There is no offence to willingly share an photo to someone," said Jess.

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