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Madelaine Thomas, a professional dominatrix, has taken an unconventional path to becoming a tech entrepreneur. After enduring the distress and humiliation caused by clients who leaked her private intimate images without consent, she was motivated to create a technological solution aimed at protecting others from similar violations. “These were beautiful pictures, I’m not ashamed of the pictures, I’m ashamed of the way that they were used against me by someone who I don’t know,” Madelaine shared, highlighting her personal connection to the issue.
In response, Madelaine founded Image Angel, a company that employs invisible forensic watermarking to track and identify those who share intimate images without permission. Since launching just over a year ago, Image Angel has garnered several awards and received recognition in Baroness Bertin’s independent pornography review as a recommended best practice. This initiative marks a significant shift from Madelaine’s previous work in the BDSM community, where she provided consensual sexual services centered around dominance and empowerment.
Intimate image abuse, often known as revenge porn, is a serious criminal offense in the UK, carrying penalties of up to two years in prison for perpetrators. This issue is widespread and not limited to people in the sex industry. Research from the Revenge Porn Helpline estimates that around 1.42% of women in the UK experience image-based abuse annually. Madelaine, 37, from Monmouthshire, pointed out the societal stigma survivors face, noting: “I think a lot of people will say, ‘you put a saucy picture out on the internet, what do you expect?’ … The fact that those images could be then shared around where I live or with people I love and used to hurt them, that’s beyond, that’s not my choice, that’s not my mistake, that’s someone being an abuser.”
Madelaine’s experience in the BDSM community, where she has worked mainly online for a decade, has grounded her sense of empowerment around her body and choices. She explained, “It’s me as a dominant woman, a woman who is empowered and strong, giving my body as a treat to someone because I wish to, because I want to, because it’s my body and I can do what I want with it.” While working within the tech space was a new challenge, she embraced her unique background as an asset rather than a setback. “I know that it’s bizarre, it’s crazy to think that someone who was a dominatrix is now a founder of a tech company, but it took someone who has been through it to know the loopholes and the changes that needed to happen,” she noted.
Image Angel’s technology is designed to be integrated by any online platform where users share images, such as dating apps or social media sites. The technology automatically embeds an invisible forensic watermark unique to each viewer into the image when accessed. This watermark remains embedded even if the image is screened, edited, or re-photographed, enabling the identification of users who share images without permission. Madelaine emphasized the reliability of the system, which draws on established tech already used in Hollywood and sports broadcasting, and is currently being tested for broader application. She hopes the presence of this technology will deter potential abusers from distributing intimate images unlawfully.
Kate Worthington from the Southwest Grid for Learning’s Revenge Porn Helpline highlighted the emotional toll intimate image abuse takes on victims, including feelings of panic, distress, and self-blame. She stressed the importance of shifting responsibility away from survivors, stating, “It is really important to have this multi-layered approach towards tackling tech facilitated gender-based abuse, because no one tool is going to be able to tackle this alone, no one helpline, it needs to be this multi-layered response.” Her organization also supports a global initiative, StopNCII.org, which works by generating digital hashes of intimate images to help participating companies detect and remove such content online.
TV presenter Jess Davies has also faced the trauma of intimate images being shared without her consent, beginning when she was just 15 years old. These experiences fueled her advocacy for women’s rights and the removal of stigma surrounding image-based abuse
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