Transitioning from Dominatrix to Technology Entrepreneur: An Unconventional Campaign Against Intimate Image Abuse

BDSM practitioner Madelaine Thomas embodies far from your standard tech founder. Following multiple instances of clients distributing her intimate photographs, she felt "angry enough to do something about it" and turned to technology for a solution.

"These were striking images, I'm unapologetic of the photographs, I'm embarrassed of the manner that they were weaponized by an individual who I have never met," explained Madelaine.

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

This represents quite a departure from her previous career in offering BDSM services, dominating clients in the realms of kink and bondage.

The Pervasive Problem

The non-consensual sharing of private images, commonly known as revenge porn, is a criminal offence with offenders facing up to two years in prison.

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

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

"I expect dignity, I expect respect, and I expect trust, and I fail to understand why those are up for debate," 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 beyond, 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. "I am as a woman in control, a woman who is confident and powerful, giving my body as a gift to someone because I wish to," she said.

"Some believe it's unusual but I view it similarly to a personal trainer or an accountant providing a service," she added.

She embraces being a unique figure in the technology sector. "I understand that it's bizarre, it's remarkable to think that an individual who was a dominatrix is now a founder of a tech company, but it required someone who has been through it to know the loopholes and the modifications that were necessary," she stated.

She maintained she was not in the least bit techy and was managed to build her company after a lot of sleepless nights, research and "bugging people" who understand 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 networks and online sites.

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 embedded into the copy of the image itself and can survive screenshots, being edited and being re-captured with a secondary device.

It means that if you find out your image has been shared without your consent, as long as the service you posted it on has the system integrated, the sharer's information will be encoded in the image and can be retrieved by a data recovery specialist so action can be taken.

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 already exists in Hollywood, it is employed in live television so this is not brand new technology, it's just a novel use 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 solid and what we now need to do is deploy it widely," she added.

She said she believed the technology would also act as a deterrent to potential perpetrators.

Changing the Narrative

An advocate from a support service said she had seen first-hand the trauma and guilt this abuse caused for victims.

"When that guilt is reinforced by a misinformed friend or service who says 'what did you expect?' that guilt can really be reinforced so it's really important that the response a victim receives is that they have not done anything wrong," she emphasized.

She added it was inspiring that Madelaine was leveraging her ordeal to create solutions, 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 integrated effort."

TV presenter Jess Davies was just 15 when photographs of her in a state of undress were shared around her local community. It was the beginning of multiple violations Jess endured in her youth that would later shape her advocacy work.

"It took so long, an excessive amount of time for someone to tell me, 'you are not to blame' and 'that was wrong'," recalled Jess.

She too is passionate about removing the stigma of intimate image abuse from the victims to the perpetrators. "It isn't a crime to willingly share an photo to someone," stated Jess.

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