BDSM practitioner Madelaine Thomas embodies not at all your typical tech founder. After multiple instances of individuals distributing her private explicit images, she was "angry enough to take action" and looked to technology for a solution.
"These were beautiful pictures, I'm not ashamed of the pictures, I'm ashamed of the manner that they were used against me by an individual who I have never met," explained Madelaine.
Little over a year after launching her company, Image Angel, which uses invisible forensic watermarking to track abusers, has garnered significant recognition and was cited as best practice in an independent pornography review earlier this year.
This marks quite a departure from her previous career in providing consensual sexual encounters, working with clients in the world of kink and bondage.
The non-consensual sharing of private images, commonly known as revenge porn, is a criminal offence with offenders risking two years in prison.
It is far from an issue exclusively faced by those in the sex industry. A study indicates that around 1.42% of the women in the UK is affected by this form of abuse each year.
Madelaine, 37, said survivors lived with shame and stigma. "I think a lot of people will comment, 'you put a private image out on the internet, what do you expect?'," she noted.
"I demand respect, I expect respect, and I expect confidence, and I don't see why those are negotiable," she added. "The fact that those images could be subsequently distributed where I live or with my loved ones and employed to cause them pain, that's beyond, that's not a decision I made, that's not an error on my part, that's someone being an abuser."
Madelaine has been practicing as a professional dominatrix, primarily online, for 10 years and always found her work empowering and fulfilling. "It's me as a dominant woman, a woman who is empowered and strong, giving my body as a gift to someone of my own volition," she described.
"Some believe it's strange but I don't see it any differently to a personal trainer or an accountant providing a service," she remarked.
She embraces being a unique figure in the world of tech. "I know that it's bizarre, it's crazy to think that an individual 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 modifications that were necessary," she explained.
She maintained she was not technically inclined and was managed to build her company after many late nights, research and "consulting experts" who know about tech.
Image Angel can be used by any digital service where people share images, for instance dating apps, social networks and online sites.
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 withstand 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 technology embedded, the sharer's information will be hidden within the image and can be extracted by a data recovery specialist so action can be taken.
Currently, one platform has implemented her tech and she's in discussions with many others.
"This technology is already in use in the film industry, it already exists in sports broadcasting so this is not an untested concept, it's just a novel use and a new system," explained 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 reliable 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 preventive measure to would-be perpetrators.
An expert from a leading helpline commented she had seen directly the trauma and guilt this abuse inflicted on victims.
"If that self-blame is reinforced by a misinformed friend or professional 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 support somebody is provided with is that they have committed no error," she stated.
She noted it was inspiring that Madelaine was leveraging her ordeal to create solutions, adding: "It is vital to have this comprehensive strategy towards tackling tech facilitated gender-based abuse, because a single solution is going to be able to tackle this alone, not just support services, it needs to be this multi-layered response."
TV presenter Jess Davies was only fifteen when photographs of her in a state of undress were shared around her local community. It was the beginning of multiple violations Jess experienced in her youth that would later inform her women's rights campaigning.
"It required years, an excessive amount of time for someone to tell me, 'you are not to blame' and 'that was wrong'," said Jess.
She too is dedicated to eliminating the shame of this crime from the victims to the offenders. "It isn't a crime to consensually send 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.
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