Professional dominatrix Madelaine Thomas is no ordinary tech entrepreneur.
After suffering repeated humiliation from clients who leaked her explicit private images, she felt “angry enough to do something” and turned to technology for answers.
“They were beautiful photos, I’m not ashamed of the images,” Thomas explains. “I’m ashamed of how they were used against me by someone I don’t know who he is.”
His company, Image Angel, uses invisible forensic watermarks to track down attackers.
Just over a year after its creation, it has won several awards and was named this year as a recommended practice by British parliamentarian Baroness Bertin.
This is a considerable change in direction from his previous activity, in which he offered consensual sexual encounters, dominating clients with BDSM practices (an acronym in English for submission, domination, sadism and masochism).
The abuse of intimate images, often called “revenge porn,” is a crime. In the United Kingdom, perpetrators of these acts are punishable by two years in prison.
In Brazil, the law provides for a prison sentence of one to five years if the act does not constitute a more serious offense. If the criminal is an ex-boyfriend and the disclosure is intended to take revenge or humiliate him, this sentence can be increased by one to two thirds.
This practice is far from being reserved only for sex workers. A report from Revenge Porn Helpline states that 1.42% of the UK female population experiences intimate image abuse each year.
Thomas is 37 years old. She is from Monmouthshire, Wales, and says women who experience this experience live with shame and stigma.
“I think a lot of people would say ‘you put a spicy picture on the internet, what did you expect?'” she said. “I expect dignity, I expect respect, I expect trust and I don’t think that’s negotiable.”
“The fact that these images can be shared where I live or with people I love and it hurts them is beyond me, it’s not my choice, it’s not my mistake, it’s someone committing abuse.”
Thomas worked as a dominatrix for 10 years, mostly online. She has always found her work stimulating and rewarding.
“It’s me as a dominant, strong, empowered woman, giving my body as a gift to someone because I want it, because I want it, because it’s my body and I can do whatever I want with it,” she says.
“People think it’s strange, but I don’t see it as any different than a nutritionist or an accountant giving advice.”
She happily accepts being an anomaly in the tech world.
“I know it’s weird, it’s crazy to think that someone who was a dominatrix is now the founder of a tech company, but it took someone going through that to know the cracks and the changes that needed to happen.”
Thomas emphasizes that he had no knowledge of technology, but managed to build his company through many sleepless nights, research and “bothering people” with technological knowledge.
“I never felt judged for my work as a dominatrix,” she says. “I felt empowered because I can offer a level of experience and knowledge of this kind of world that they could never have had.”
How does the technology work?
Any online platform that offers sharing images of people can use Image Angel, including dating apps, social media, and websites.
When a user has access to an image, they automatically receive an invisible forensic watermark unique to them.
This means that if you discover that your photo has been shared without your consent, if the platform you posted it on has the technology installed, the information of the person who shared it will be hidden in the image and can be retrieved by a data recovery specialist so that necessary action can be taken.
So far, one platform has already adopted the technology and Thomas is in negotiations with several others.
But how do you know if it’s effective?
“This technology already exists in Hollywood and in sports broadcasts, so it’s not something completely new,” she explains. “It’s just a new app and a new system.”
“We’ve tested it, we’ve partnered with a company with 30 years of experience in technology development and, therefore, we know it’s something solid and now we need to test it at scale.”
Thomas hopes the technology will also act to deter would-be abusers of intimate images.
Kate Worthington, of the South West Learning Network’s (SWGFL) Revenge Porn helpline, says she has personally observed the panic, anxiety and guilt felt by victims of intimate image abuse.
“If that guilt is reinforced by an uninformed department or friend who says, ‘well, why did you take those photos?’, that guilt can really be reinforced,” she explains.
“So it’s very important that people’s reaction is that they haven’t done anything wrong.”
Worthington says Madelaine Thomas’ decision to use her experience to create change was fantastic.
For her, “it is very important to have this multiple approach to fight against gender abuse facilitated by technology, because no tool or helpline will be able to deal with it alone. We need this multiple approach.”
SWGFL has a global tool called StopNCII.org. It works by creating a chop (cryptographic code) for intimate images and videos of a person, which are shared with participating companies. With this, they can help detect and remove images, preventing them from being shared online.
British TV presenter Jess Davies was just 15 when images of her in her underwear were shared in her hometown. It was the first in a series of incidents she experienced in her teens and twenties, which would later form the basis of her campaign for women’s rights.
“It took a long time, too long for someone to tell me ‘it wasn’t your fault’ and ‘this shouldn’t have happened,'” she recalls.
Davies lives in Penarth, Wales. She also strongly advocates shifting the stigma surrounding intimate image abuse from victims to perpetrators.
“It’s not a crime to send someone an image consensually,” said Davies, now 32. “But it’s a crime to distribute the image without consent and I think that’s still where the fault lies.”
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