Overview

Introduction
A Review of Data Hiding in Images

Digital Steganography

Applications
Eugene T. Lin and Edward J. Delp – Copyright Protection
– Feature Tagging
– Secret Communications

Data Hiding Techniques

Digital Embedding

Steganalysis

Kristin Burke 1 2

Introduction Digital Steganography

Steganography - hiding secret information
so that its existence is concealed

Used for hundreds of years

Example:
I’m feeling really stuffy. Emily’s medicine
wasn’t strong enough without another
febrifuge.
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Terminology
– Message
» Data that the sender wishes to hide
» Can be text, images, audio, video, etc.
– Cover
» Medium in which the message is embedded
– Stego-image
» The resulting image and the message combined
– Stego-key (optional)
» used to extract the message from the stego-image

Digital Steganography

Recovering the message from the stego-
image requires:
– stego-image
– stego-key (if applicable)
– (sometimes) original image

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 Applications Applications

Feature Tagging

Copyright Protection
– Names with photos
– secret copyright notice or watermark is
embedded in the image – Directions with maps
– when image is distributed, can be time stamped – Number of times an image is viewed
– watermark can detect if image is modified
Secret Communications
– avoids scrutiny that cryptography invites
– trade secret, blueprint, etc can be
communicated without outside knowledge

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Data Hiding Techniques DHT

Hiding Capacity
Robustness
– size of information that can be hidden in a – Ability of the embedded data to remain intact if
cover image undergoes modulations
– larger capacity = smaller cover = decreased – Critical in watermarking
bandwidth
Tamper Resistance

Perceptual Transparency – Difficulty for an attacker to alter or forge a
message once imbedded
– Noise modulation or distortion of cover image

Others
– Of paramount importance in watermarking
– Computational complexity of encoding and
decoding
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Data Embedding Least Significant Bit Encoding

Digital image consists of a matrix of color

Three categories: and intensity values
– Gray scale image- 8 bits/pixel
– Least significant Bit embedding (Simple – Full color image- 24 bits/pixel
embedding)
LSB embeds bits of message directly into
– Transform Techniques the least significant bit plane of the cover
– Perceptual Masking image

Very simple, high perceptual transparency

Low robustness, low tamper resistance
– sensitive to cropping, rotation, filtering, etc.
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 Steganos LSB
24 bit image example:

Specific LSB technique

24 bit images use 3 bytes to represent a color value (8 bits = 1 byte)

Can imbed data in image, audio and text 1 pixel = (00100111 11101001 11001000)
covers red green blue

Simplified Example with a 24 bit pixel:

1 pixel: (00100111 11101001 11001000)
Insert 101: (00100111 11101000 11001001)
red green blue

Digital Image Steganography: Data Sneaking Between the Pixels 13 14

http://www.mills.edu/ACAD_INFO/MCS/CS/S02MCS125/Steganography.htm

LSB Example- Step 1 LSB Example - Step 2

The first least significant bitplane of ‘Arctic hare’ has been replaced with the first most
significant bitplane of ‘F15’: 64 KB hidden. Extracted to the right.
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LSB Example - Step 3 LSB Example - Step 6

The 5 least significant bitplanes of ‘Arctic hare’ have been replaced with the 5 most
The 2 least significant bitplanes of ‘Arctic hare’ have been replaced with the 2 most significant bitplanes of ‘F15’: 323 KB hidden
significant bitplanes of ‘F15’: 129 KB hidden.
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 LSB Example - Step 7 Transform Embedding

Embedding the message by modulating the
coefficients in a transform domain
– Discrete-Cosine Transformation (DCT)
– Discrete Courier Transform
– Wavelet Transform

Offer superior robustness against lossy
compression

Spread-spectrum techniques spread energy
The 7 least significant bitplanes of ‘Arctic hare’ have been replaced with the 7 most of message across frequency bands
significant bitplanes of ‘F15’: 452 KB hidden.
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http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~fapp2/steganography/image_downgrading/08.html

DCT Perceptual Masking Systems

Exploit properties of the human visual
system

“Masking” - signal is imperceptible in the
presence of other signals (needle in a
Find
DCT or wavelet
transform insignificant Insert haystack)
coefficients 101110111011
f 110011010011
101101011101
Perform analysis of image before
100011011101
(message) imbedding and place data in specific
into coefficients
Take inverse
transform
regions
f-1
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Steganalysis Steganalysis

Practice of attacking steganographic
Techniques divided into categories:
methods by detection, destruction, – stego-only
extraction or modification of embedded data – known cover

Success: – known message
– Finding message in secret communication – chosen stego
– Finding & changing watermark in copyright – chosen message (most powerful)
images
Most difficult attacks:

Like cryptanalysis in that entire security – Modifying the embedded message
based on stego-key – Deducing the stego-key
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 Review

Introduction

Digital Steganography

Applications
Questions?

Data Hiding Techniques

Digital Embedding

Steganalysis

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