Improved Steganographic Method Preserving Pixel-Value Differencing Histogram with Modulus Function

Abstract

We herein advance a secure steganographic algorithm that uses a turnover policy and a novel adjusting process. Although the method of Wang et al. uses Pixel-Value Differencing (PVD) and their modulus function provides high capacity and good image quality, the embedding process causes a number of artifacts, such as abnormal increases and fluctuations in the PVD histogram, which may reveal the existence of the hidden message. In order to enhance the security of the algorithm, a turnover policy is used that prevents abnormal increases in the histogram values and a novel adjusting process is devised to remove the fluctuations at the border of the subrange in the PVD histogram. The proposed method therefore eliminates all the weaknesses of the PVD steganographic methods thus far proposed and guarantees secure communication. In the experiments described herein, the proposed algorithm is compared with other PVD steganographic algorithms by using well-known steganalysis techniques, such as RS-analysis, steganalysis for LSB matching, and histogram-based attacks. The results support our contention that the proposed method enhances security by keeping the PVD histogram similar to the cover, while also providing high embedding capacity and good imperceptibility to the naked eye.

Block-Based Steganographic Algorithm Using Modulus Function and Pixel-Value Differencing

“…Joo, et al in [54] presented an enhancement on [53] method by embedding different amounts of secret data based on pixel-pair complexity. Tests in this method showed that the difference histogram had a shape closer to the cover-image which was hard to be detected by histogram analysis.…”

Comparative Analysis of Canny Edge based Image Steganography with RSA Encryption

“…The proposed PSNR is higher due to improved edge distortion. [8] In describing the image steganography, which is based on canny method. Besides employing the hash based approach as a fundamental stage, it takes advantage of edge detection technique.…”

Data Security Using Cryptography and Steganography Techniques

“…On the contrary, if the difference value is smaller than 19, this means that the two pixels are located in low level (smooth area) and PVD_MPK method is used to hide data to increase image quality. Then, find the optimum range R i for the difference d i where R i [l i , u i ], and l i and u i are the lower and upper bound of each range of the range table and l i ≤ d i ≤ u i because this method uses the ranges (0-4), (5-9), (10)(11)(12)(13)(14), (15)(16)(17)(18)(19), (20)(21)(22)(23)(24), (25-29) etc. to calculate the new difference and make it nearly as possible to the original difference.…”

“…In table II, a comparison between the proposed method and method in [22] has been made by hiding (63.408, 62.576, 62.672, 62.208, and 62.000) secret bytes in 512 x 512 cover images (Baboon, Boat, Lake, Lena, and Peppers) respectively. The results indicate that, the proposed method has higher PSNR values than method in [22], although more hiding capacity is used than that used by method in [22]. This proves the improved the stego-image quality and the hiding capacity, also the suitability of the proposed method.…”