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An efficient multi-bit steganography algorithm in spatial domain with two-layer security

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Abstract

Steganography is a very useful technique which aims at preventing loss of privacy during the process of data communication, especially over the internet. It can involve different forms of media like image, video (i.e., image sequence), audio etc. We propose a novel steganographic approach in spatial domain using pixel value differencing (PVD) or sample value differencing (SVD) technique and Galois field (GF (28)) operations in order to provide a two layered security for hiding message bits. Our method not only has a very high embedding capacity, but is also capable of withstanding statistical attacks. The proposed method embeds from 2 to 6 bits of the message per pixel in each image component, whereas it can embed a minimum of 6 bits and a maximum of 13 bits of message per sample in audio component at the expense of no perceivable distortion and loss of the cover media quality.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank Mr. Uttiya Ghosh for his partial help in implementation of this project when he was the student of St. Thomas’ College of Engineering & Technology, Kolkata.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Computer Science & Engineering, Jadavpur University, Kolkata, 700 032, India

    Nabanita Mukherjee (Ganguly) & Sanjoy Kumar Saha

  2. Cryptology and Security Research Unit, Indian Statistical Institute, Kolkata, 700 108, India

    Goutam Paul

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  1. Nabanita Mukherjee (Ganguly)
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  2. Goutam Paul
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  3. Sanjoy Kumar Saha
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Correspondence to Goutam Paul.

Appendix A: StegExpose outputs on sample images

Appendix A: StegExpose outputs on sample images

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Mukherjee (Ganguly), N., Paul, G. & Saha, S.K. An efficient multi-bit steganography algorithm in spatial domain with two-layer security. Multimed Tools Appl 77, 18451–18481 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11042-018-5720-3

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