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BDSM practitioner Madelaine Thomas represents not at all your standard tech founder. Following repeated instances of clients distributing her intimate photographs, she felt "angry enough to do something about it" and turned to technology for a solution.

"Those were beautiful pictures, I'm not ashamed of the pictures, I'm ashamed of the way that they were weaponized by someone who I have never met," explained Madelaine.

Just over a year after launching her venture, Image Angel, which employs invisible forensic watermarking to identify abusers, has won several awards and was cited as best practice in an independent pornography review earlier this year.

This represents a significant shift from her background in providing consensual sexual encounters, working with 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 punishable crime with perpetrators risking two years in prison.

It is far from an issue uniquely experienced by those in the sex industry. A study suggests that approximately 1.42% of the UK female population is impacted by intimate image abuse each year.

Madelaine, thirty-seven, said victims lived with feelings of humiliation. "In my view a lot of people will comment, 'you put a saucy picture out on the internet, what do you expect?'," she noted.

"I demand dignity, I expect respect, and I expect trust, and I don't see why those are up for debate," she added. "The reality that those images could be then shared in my community or with my loved ones and employed to cause them pain, that's unacceptable, that's not my choice, that's not my mistake, that's an individual being an abuser."

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 confident and powerful, giving my body as a gift to someone of my own volition," she said.

"Some believe it's unusual but I don't see it any differently to a personal trainer or an accountant giving advice," she added.

She embraces being a unique figure 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 creator of a tech company, but it took someone who has been through it to understand the flaws and the modifications that were necessary," she stated.

She insisted she was not in the least bit techy and was managed to build her company after many sleepless nights, investigation and "bugging people" who know about tech.

How Does the Technology Work?

Image Angel can be used by any online platform where people exchange photos, for instance dating apps, social media and websites.

When an image is accessed by a user, it is automatically embedded with an invisible forensic watermark which is unique to them.

This invisible watermark is encoded within the copy of the image itself and can survive screenshots, being edited and being re-captured with a different camera.

It means that if you discover your image has been circulated without your consent, providing the service you used has the system integrated, the sharer's information will be encoded in the image and can be extracted by a data recovery specialist so legal steps can follow.

To date, one platform 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 an untested concept, it's just a novel use and a new system," said Madelaine.

"And we've tested it, we're partnering with a company that has decades of expertise 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 said she hoped the technology would also act as a deterrent to would-be intimate image abusers.

Removing Stigma, Shifting Blame

An expert from a support service said she had seen first-hand the panic, distress and self-blame this abuse caused for victims.

"When that guilt is reinforced by a uninformed acquaintance 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 crucial that the response a victim receives is that they have not done anything wrong," she stated.

She added it was inspiring that Madelaine was using her experience to create solutions, saying: "It is vital to have this comprehensive strategy towards addressing tech facilitated abuse, because no one tool is going to be able to solve this problem, not just support services, it needs to be this integrated effort."

TV presenter Jess Davies was only fifteen when images of her in a state of undress were shared around her local community. It was the first of several incidents Jess endured in her teens and 20s that would later inform her women's rights campaigning.

"It took so long, an excessive amount of time for someone to say to me, 'you are not to blame' and 'that shouldn't have happened'," recalled Jess.

She too is passionate about eliminating the shame of this crime from the victims to the offenders. "There is no offence to willingly share an photo to someone," stated Jess.

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