H.264/AVC video authentication using skipped macroblocks for an erasable watermark

Abstract

This paper presents a new watermarking framework, suitable for authentication of H.264 compressed videos. The authentication data is embedded as fragile, blind and erasable watermark with low video quality degradations. Because of using a fragile watermark, hard authentication is possible. In contrast to other approaches, the watermarking is done after the H.264 compression process. Hence, the authentication information can be embedded in already encoded videos. To reconstruct the original H.264 compressed video the watermark can be removed. The framework is based on a new transcoder, which analyses the original H.264 bit stream, computes a watermark, embeds the watermark and generates a new H.264 bit stream. To authenticate the video a hash value is used. This value is encrypted with a private key of an asymmetric cryptosystem. The payload of the watermark consists of the encrypted hash value and a certificate with the public key. Some skipped macroblock of the H.264 video are used to embed the watermark. A special process selects these macroblocks. This process sets the distribution and the number of skipped blocks as well as the number of embedded bits per block to achieve low video quality degradations and low data rate. To embed the watermark the performance of several approaches is discussed and analyzed. The result of the framework is a new watermarked H.264 bit stream. All data necessary for authentication are embedded and cannot get lost.

A robust fingerprint watermark-based authentication scheme in H.264/AVC video

“…For instance, the method of Pröfrock et al [9] against lossy compression H.264/AVC, robustness with regular video attacks and good video quality but not high capacity; the method of Polyák and Fehér [10] gives good results, lower complexity, faster execution, against H.264/AVC and XviD lossy compression process but not robustness with regular video attacks; the method of Liu and Zhao [11] only shows stable to H.264 compression standard, variable geometry and other attacks; and the method of Zou and Bloom [13] is done very quickly at low cost, good compression video quality but not robustness. However, our proposed scheme can achieve high capacity, good quality and robustness.…”

“…1b. The first approach embeds watermark into raw video before compressing video such as the H.264/AVC video watermarking method of Proföck et al [9] against lossy compression, the strong block selection method against lossy compression standards (e.g. H.264, XviD) of Polyák and Fehér [10] and the new watermarking method based on video 1-D DFT transform and Radon transform of Liu and Zhao [11].…”

Content fragile watermarking for H.264/AVC video authentication

“…Pröfock et al (Pröfrock et al, 2005) proposed a blind, fragile and effaceable watermarking approach to ensure that the integrity of the H.264 encoded video bitstream. This watermark is embedded in selected skipped MBs of H.264.…”

“…In our paper, we have targeted fragile watermarking techniques that have been developed for H.264/AVC video sequences. The watermark is embedded in the compressed domain (T. Kim, Park, & Hong, 2012;Kuo, Lo, & Lin, 2008;Qiu, Marziliano, He, & Sun, 2004;Wang & Hsu, 2008;Zhang & Ho, 2006), or directly in the compressed bitstream of the H.264/AVC encoder (Pröfrock, Richter, Schlauweg, & Müller, 2005;Razib, Shirmohammadi, & Zhao, 2007), or simply inserted as Supplemental Enhancement Information (SEI) in the H.264/AVC bitstream (Ramaswamy & Rao, 2006). In the compressed domain, Qiu et al (Qiu et al, 2004) presented a hybrid watermarking scheme that used DCT coefficients for robust watermarking and motion vectors (MV) for fragile watermarking.…”

Enhanced Nested Video Watermarking Using Wavelets and Geometric Warping

“…Another field where scientists focus is on embedding into a compressed domain which can be done during or after the encoding process ( [27], [28]). Alternatively, techniques to work on raw format have also received attention.…”