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In the last years, the utilization of information hiding techniques for empowering modern strains of malware has become a serious concern for security experts. Such an approach allows attackers to act in a stealthy manner, for instance, to covertly exfiltrate confidential data or retrieve additional command & control payloads for the operation of malware. Therefore, the deep understanding of data hiding mechanisms is a core requirement, as it allows designing effective countermeasures. Unfortunately, the most recent evolution of information-hiding-capable threats enjoys reversible properties, i.e., the abused network flow is restored to its original form. Hence, detection approaches based on the comparison of different traffic samples may not work anymore. In this paper, we further investigate various methods for performing reversible data hiding for network covert channels. Specifically, we extend our previous research by considering different scenarios focusing on IPv4 traffic and HTTP conversations. The results confirm that reversibility can be used in various network conditions and is not impaired by middleboxes. In addition, engineering countermeasures or mitigation techniques could be difficult, thus requiring to consider reversible mechanisms already in the early design stages of a protocol/deployment.

Plain text information hiding is vulnerable to active attacks such as deletion and change,which makes the embedded secret information damaged.Blockchain is characterized by non-tampering,non-forgery,anonymity and node information synchronization,making it a natural platform for building hidden channels and ensuring that secret information is not destroyed.This paper proposes the blockchain covert communication model for plain text information hiding.Firstly,the location of the embedded secret information is determined according to the partial order relation.The sender uses the space method to embed the secret information into the plain text content.Then,a scenario of hidden communication in the blockchain network is constructed,and the sender publishes the transaction containing the plain text content to the blockchain network.Finally,after the transaction is packaged and a chain block is formed,any node can obtain the file as the receiver,but only the trusted party can extract the secret information through the inverse process of the embedded algorithm.Experimental comparison and analysis show that the model has better anti-detection,robustness,security and higher hiding capacity.More importantly,the blockchain as a channel enables the identity of the trusted party to be hidden,and the concealment of the communication process is doubly guaranteed.

This paper presents a new study about the communication system named StegFog. It is based on applying distributed steganography linked with the concept of cyberfog security. The idea of cyberfog is to secure data by splitting it into numerous fragments and spreading them to end-user devices. The design of StegFog combines steganographic methods previously investigated by the Authors – StegHash and SocialSteg Disc. The reference design of the system is proposed and analyzed in terms of security, reliability, performance and timing. To prove the feasibility of the proposed solution, the prototype of StegFog was implemented, consisting of steganographic nodes operating over BitTorrent P2P networks with a hidden communication channel established by the multimedia files shared within it. Experiments were conducted for the implemented prototype to understand the basic features of the system, such as operational aspects of the address generator constructed using the modified StegHash method, timing of the basic methods within the system – reading, writing and notifying, steganographic rate of the system and overall security provided by the system. The presented results show how system such as StegFog aligned with the cyberfog security concept could be considered as the protection measure for secure network communications. The practicality, challenges and research directions to extend the concept are also discussed.

Steganography is the showing of disguising a message inside another message or a certifiable article like message, picture, or video is covered inside another record, message, picture, or video. The restricted intel is concealed so to speak that it not unmistakable to the normal eyes. Huge learning progression, which has arisen as a key asset in different applications including picture steganography, has gotten extended thought lately. Where generally single strategy is utilized in encryption which can be decoded effectively so to beat this method in this project three different procedures are utilized, for example, Recurrent Neural Network-based (RNN), which can consequently produce excellent message covers based on a mystery bitstream that should be covered up. Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) are profound learning calculations that are exceptionally strong for the examination of pictures, which is utilized to encode the produced text covers into a little picture. We prepared our model with an enormous number of misleadingly produced tests and acquired a great gauge of the measurable language model and HIGAN, which develops the encoding network made from holding up blocks to mask the combination secret picture into another grouping picture of the more unpretentious size to yield a lower bending and higher visual quality steganographic picture. The continuous endeavor means to use steganography for an image with another image using spatial region methodology.

Since the concept of coverless information hiding was proposed, it has been greatly developed due to its effectiveness of resisting the steganographic tools. In this paper, a new coverless steganography is presented to hide the secret data in a more secure way and to enhance the robustness against attacks. This method depends on frequency domain. The embedding process consists of several steps. Firstly, the secret data is divided into no overlapping segments. Secondly, a set of images is collected to find appropriate images to be stego images. Thirdly, to build a hash sequence for an image, a powerful hashing algorithm is used. Fourthly, for each image hash sequence, the inverted index structure is created. Fifthly, choose the image which its hash equivalent to the secret data segment. Several tests are done to measure the robustness of the proposed method. The results of the experiments reveal that the proposed strategy is resistant to a variety of image processing attacks such as joint photographic experts group (JPEG) compression, noise, low pass filtering, scaling, rotation and median and mean filter, brightness, and sharpening. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite the rapidly growing studies on Arabic text steganography (ATS) noted recently; systematic, in-depth, and critical reviews are in scarcity due to high overlap or low segregation level among the existing review articles linked to this research area. As such, the objective of this paper is to present an extensive systematic literature review (SLR) on the techniques and algorithms used to analyse ATS. Data were retrieved from three primary databases, namely Science direct Journal, IEEE Explore Digital Library, and Scopus Journal. As a result, 214 publications were identified since the past 5 years regarding methods of analysing ATS. A comprehensive SLR was executed to detect a range of unique characteristics from the algorithms, which led to the discovery of a new structure of ATS categories. Essentially, a hybrid method for ATS was identified with other sub-disciplines, especially cryptography, which leads to a new branch in enhancing security for ATS. Other relevant findings included key performance and evaluation criteria used to measure the performance of the algorithms (i.e., capacity, invisibility, robustness, & security). 87 % of the reviewed articles are the capacity measurement performance. Therefore, it disclosed a huge potential for the other two criteria (i.e. invisibility, robustness and security) to set a benchmark for future research endeavour. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Information hiding is an important technique for security-related applications, and it can be used wildly in many scenarios. Secret data embedding methods are proposed in spatial, frequency, and other domains by researchers in recent years. After investigating the existing information hiding schemes, we find that there is still room to improve the data embedding performance. Inspired by some works of literature, we propose a new scheme based on the modulus function with Minimum Pixel Modification (MPM22) for hiding secret data into carriers. The main idea of the scheme is to embed confidential bits into cover-image pixels while minimizing modification to original pixels. The correctness and high performance of the scheme are proved in mathematics and comprehensive experiments. Experimental result shows MPM22 has the largest embedding capacity (3 < bpp (bit per pixel) less than 7) compared with other schemes while maintaining the best image quality (peak signal-to-noise ratio (PSNR) > 36.1 dB@ k = 3 , PSNR > 30.5 dB @ k = 4)。 The experimental result also confirms that our proposed scheme has higher performance than other schemes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The technique of information hiding is very important in achieving security of important and sensitive data, especially those that are transmitted through various digital communication channels because it has robust characteristics that distinguish it from encryption techniques, the most important of which is that it is not perceived by protrusive and hackers, as it is based on the principle of hiding those data inside other digital media as a carrier cover. On the other hand, with the development of hiding techniques, techniques developed to try extracting its hiding to hacking its contents, for this reason and to increase the efficiency of these methods, the encryption and hiding techniques was combined together. The proposed method depends on distributing secret data on several digital audio files of type WAV in random way depends on circular secret key values that is generated in random order that be agreed upon between the sender and the receiver. This technique has achieved high durability, and in the event of suspicion of the existence of secret content within any WAV file, the multiplicity of carrier files and their different length, as well as random distribution of data in them, all these characteristic eliminates the suspicion of any confidential content, as well as complicates the file retrieved process if the suspicion be occurs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Three-dimensional (3-D) meshes are commonly used to represent virtual surfaces and volumes. Over the past decade, 3-D meshes have emerged in industrial, medical, and entertainment applications, being of large practical significance for 3-D mesh steganography and steganalysis. In this article, we provide a systematic survey of the literature on 3-D mesh steganography and steganalysis. Compared with an earlier survey (Girdhar et al., 2017), we propose a new taxonomy of steganographic algorithms with four categories: 1) two-state domain, 2) LSB domain, 3) permutation domain, and 4) transform domain. Regarding steganalysis algorithms, we divide them into two categories: 1) universal steganalysis and 2) specific steganalysis. For each category, the history of technical developments and the current technological level are introduced and discussed. Finally, we highlight some promising future research directions and challenges in improving the performance of 3-D mesh steganography and steganalysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This aticle describes invisibility and readability in terms of the size of the basic unit of information that was attached to a displayed image by using our proposed method. The proposed method enables us to invisibly attach information to a displayed image on a flat panel display (FPD) and to extract the information from a captured video image of the displayed image. The information was attached to a single-color component of the displayed image by using temporal and spatial brightness modulation. The information was arranged within a given rectangular area of the displayed image as a black-and-white checkerboard pattern. The checkerboard pattern was used because it is a typical example of a t2-D pattern with a high density. The checkerboard pattern consists of squares having the same side length L. L was changed to examine the invisibility and readability in terms of the size of the basic unit of information. First, we assessed invisibility to the human eye of the information attached to the displayed image on the FPD. The experimental results showed that the degree of invisibility was 90% or over for all L when a frame rate for the displayed image was 60 fps. That is, the invisibility is independent of L. We also examined readability of the attached information for a video camera. The experimental results showed a lower limit value of L that satisfied the readability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Journal of Zhengzhou University (Natural Science Edition) is the property of Journal of Zhengzhou University (Natural Science Edition) Editorial Office and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Multimedia information (e.g., photos) is subject to numerous attacks when extensively dispersed, excellent stealth and robustness play a critical role in information concealment. Next, to further improve the imperceptibility of the generated images, we introduce an information embedding based on feature extraction, since the feature points themselves are robust as strong corner points in the images. We will perform specific practical applications in information‐hiding scenarios, such as ticket anticounterfeiting, copyright protection, tampering hints, and covert marking. As a result, while assuring the accuracy of hidden data, assault resistance must also be addressed. In this paper, a strategy for watermark embedding utilizing image feature points is proposed. In principle, the embedding and extraction of digital watermarks are achieved in the transform domain by discrete wavelet transform processing to make digital images more robust than before. The effectiveness of the algorithm is analyzed by experimental data, in which different wavelet bases are used. To check the robustness of the watermarking algorithm, various attacks are performed on watermarked images. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Image non-additive steganography not only can better maintain the distribution of image elements, but also has high detection resistance.Firstly, the image non-additive image steganography methods were sorted out and divided into two major categories: non-additive distortion design and non-additive steganography coding design.The non-additive distortion was designed into three categories: theoretical models based, modification principles based and adversarial detection based, and compared these methods.Finally, the difficult problems faced by non-additive steganography and the future development ideas were analyzed.

Image non-additive steganography not only can better maintain the distribution of image elements, but also has high detection resistance. Firstly, the image non-additive image steganography methods were sorted out and divided into two major categories: non-additive distortion design and non-additive steganography coding design. The non-additive distortion was designed into three categories: theoretical models based, modification principles based and adversarial detection based, and compared these methods. Finally, the difficult problems faced by non-additive steganography and the future development ideas were analyzed.

JPEG steganalysis aims to detect stego JPEG images. For some robust steganography methods, in order to enhance stego images’ robustness of resisting JPEG recompression from lossy channel such SNS or photo sharing websites, steganographer may intentionally recompress cover image several times with quantization matrix of targeted channel, which thereby make it possible to transmit stego data in such channel for better disguise. In addition, there are huge number of cover JPEG images may be recompressed for various reasons, such as processing by some tools. Thus a better steganalysis method for such images is needed. In this paper, we investigate the steganalysis method for images recompressed with the same quantization matrix, namely, discriminate recompressed JPEG cover images and its stego images. We present some observed phenomenon on recompressed JPEG images, and design methods to enhance the sensitivity of feature based and deep model based steganalysis methods for this task. To verify their effectiveness with different acquisition of recompression prior-knowledge, we conduct experiments in various settings including conventional setting and mixing samples of different recompressing times in training. Their results demonstrate that the proposed method can notably improve detection accuracy on recompressed JPEG images. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes three methods of creating a subliminal channel in visual cryptography that are defined for a (2,2) sharing scheme. They work by hiding additional covert information besides the original encrypted image. The first channel is revealed when the user folds the share along the specific axis. The second channel encodes subpixels on the basis of the encrypted message bits. It is designed to hide a wide range of data types. The third channel may be applied to a single share or multiple shares and is revealed when the proper parts of the shares are stacked. Fold and overlapping algorithms are adequate for printed shares, but the encryption method is only suitable for digital shares. The capacity of these methods ranges from half of the image size to the whole image size. The presented algorithms work on black-and-white images but are expandable to color visual cryptography. They may find applications in steganography and other data-hiding techniques. The created subliminal channels do not interfere with regular images that may still be revealed by stacking the shares. In short, this article introduces subliminal channels in visual cryptography, presents three algorithms for both binary and colorful images, shows examples of use with the results obtained, and discusses features of each method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Basrah Journal of Science / Magallat Al-Barat Li-L-ulum is the property of Republic of Iraq Ministry of Higher Education & Scientific Research (MOHESR) and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Journal on Communication / Tongxin Xuebao is the property of Journal on Communications Editorial Office and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Due to its efficiency in resisting steganographic techniques, the concept of coverless information concealment has been considerably improved since it was first presented. In this paper; a new coverless steganography for text hiding is proposed in order to better hide secret data and improve attack resistance. This method depends on spatial domain. The embedding process consists of several steps. Firstly, the secret data is divided into no overlapping segments. Secondly, find appropriate images to be stego images and divided it to blocks. Thirdly, to build a hash sequence for an image, a powerful hashing algorithm is used. Fourthly, choose the image which its hash equivalent to the secret data segment. Fifthly, choose the image which its hash equivalent to the secret data segment. The suggested method's robustness is evaluated by a series of tests. The results of the studies show that the proposed technique is resistant to JPEG compression, noise, low pass filtering, scaling, rotation, median and mean filtering, brightness, and sharpening, among other image processing attacks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

At present, the image steganography method based on CNN has achieved good results. The trained model and its parameters are of great value. Once leaked, the secret image will be exposed. To protect the security of steganographic network model parameters in the transmission process, an idea based on network model parameter scrambling is proposed in this paper. Firstly, the sender trains the steganography network and extraction network, encrypts the extraction network parameters with the key shared by the sender and the receiver, then sends the extraction network and parameters to the receiver through the public channel, and the receiver recovers them with the key after receiving, to achieve more secure secret communication. In this way, even if the network parameters are intercepted by a third party in the transmission process, the interceptor cannot extract the real secret information. In this paper, the classical Joseph algorithm is used as the scrambling algorithm to scramble the extracted network model parameters of the StegoPNet steganography network. The experimental results show that when the scrambled parameters are used for secret image extraction, a meaningless image independent of the secret image is extracted, it shows that this method can well protect the security of steganography network model. At the same time, this method also has good scalability, and can use a variety of different scrambling algorithms to scramble the parameters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Chinese Journal of Network & Information Security is the property of Beijing Xintong Media Co., Ltd. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Steganography is one of the most crucial methods for information hiding, which embeds secret data on an ordinary file or a cover message for avoiding detection. We designed a novel rate-distortion-based large-capacity secure steganographic system, called rate-distortion-based Stego (RD-Stego), to effectively solve the above requirement. The considered effectiveness of our system design includes embedding capacity, adaptability to chosen cover attacks, and the stability of the trained model. The proposed stego scheme can hide multiple three-channel color images and QR codes within another three-channel color image with low visual distortion. Empirically, with a certain degree of robustness against the chosen cover attack, we state that the system offers up to 192+ bits-per-pixel (bpp) embedding of a payload and leaks no secret-related information. Moreover, to provide theoretical foundations for our cost function design, a mutual information-based explanation of the choices of regulation processes is herein included. Finally, we justify our system's claimed advantages through a series of experiments with publicly available benchmark datasets. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Imperceptibility is the primary goal of information hiding technology, reducing the modification rate is an effective way to improve imperceptibility. The codeword replacement based on shortest Euclidean distance for VoIP steganography is proposed based on the principle that the less modification to a cover will achieve the high imperceptibility, which decreases the modification to a cover and improves the steganography efficiency, thus the invisibility of steganography is enhanced without reducing the quality. After a steganography unit is defined, the Euclidean distance between the secret message and the linear predictive coding (LPC) parameters in the unit is calculated, and the LPC parameter with the shortest distance is selected and replaced by the secret message. The complementary neighbor vertex(CNV) method is employed to indicate which LPC parameters are modified. Compared with other methods, the experimental results show that the proposed method has higher steganography efficiency, its steganography modification rate reduce to 22.7%, its KL divergence indicates the better security, and its PESQ exceeds 4.0, which shows good speech quality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

PE (Portable executable) file is a standard format for executable file and is applied extensively. PE file has diversity, uncertainty of file size, complexity of file structure and singleness of file format, which make PE file easy to be a carrier of information hiding, especially for that of large hiding capacity. A novel software information hiding algorithm is proposed, which makes full use of display characteristics of palette icon of portable executable file. In this algorithm, the information is embedded into the transparent area of the icon by taking advantage of the redundant color items in the palette. The experimental results show that after embedding the information, the size of the icon remains unchanged, that is, the size of the resource section will not change, and the size of the PE file will not change. On the other hand, the icon with embedded data can be correctly analyzed and displayed without any distortion. PE file can run normally, and does not affect the performance of the program, so the algorithm has good concealment. The algorithm selects an index value whose color is black according to rules in the XOR bitmap, these index values are encoded for information hiding, its complexity is low. At the same time, we can further improve the hiding capacity by adding one or more icons to PE file. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Coverless image steganography has emerged as a significant research direction in the field of steganography in recent years. Unlike traditional image steganography, it does not require modifying the cover image to achieve information hiding. This review aims to systematically summarize the research progress and challenges in coverless image steganography. Firstly, the paper introduces the basic principles and classification methods of coverless image steganography, including embedding methods based on low-level image features and those combining advanced semantic features from deep learning. Secondly, it discusses key research achievements in this field, such as novel embedding algorithms, efficient extraction methods, and robustness enhancement techniques against various attacks. Additionally, the review highlights major challenges faced by current coverless image steganography, including difficulties in secret information extraction, capacity limitations, and practicality issues, and explores potential solutions and future research directions. Through comprehensive analysis of existing literature, the review aims to provide researchers with a holistic perspective, fostering further development and application of coverless image steganography. The paper includes 124 key contributions, offering a comprehensive overview of coverless image steganography, covering its fundamental principles, research progress, challenges, and solutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In all forms of confidential communication, the most significant element is security. Cryptography can be used to secure the information, but it discloses the presence of covert communication. Hence, steganography was invented; steganography is an art of concealed communication. Steganography is performed by inserting the secret information in a cover media to camouflage the presence of covert communication. In image steganography, an image is used as the cover media for secure communication. There are various image steganography techniques invented by many researchers, but a small number of them focus on improving visual quality and increasing payload capacity simultaneously. This paper presents a secret data modification based high capacity image steganography technique using genetic algorithm (GA). This new technique uses the least significant bit (LSB) replacement steganography, to embed the secret data. However, the secret data is rearranged and modified before embedding it in the LSBs of the cover image. The parameters used to rearrange and modify the secret data are controlled by GA. A unique concept called flexible chromosome is introduced which allows GA to interpret the chromosome value in different ways. GA attempts to find the best possible parameter value that yields high visual quality of the stego images. The stego images produced by the proposed technique have an average PSNR value of 46.41 dB and 40.83 dB for 2 bit per pixel (bpp) and 3 bpp data hiding capacity respectively.

The state of the art steganography approaches strictly assume that the receiver has access to a steganographic key. This limitation was mitigated for images in spacial domain, but the approach does not apply to JPEG images. In this paper, we introduce a keyless steganography scheme for JPEG images. Despite the spatial domain counterpart, our approach for the JPEG domain effectively preserves higher-order statistical models that are used in steganalysis. We show that our approach does not degrade image quality either. The proposed approach is a Side-Information (SI) steganography in the sense that its input is a never-compressed image. Another characteristic of the proposed approach is the separation of the embedding modification and data extraction domains, which can initiate further studies of similar approaches in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Blockchain technology has demonstrated promising potential for covert communication. Although a series of studies have investigated blockchain-based covert communication, systematic research on the information-hiding patterns and covert communication patterns built on the blockchain is absent. This paper aims to conduct a comprehensive analysis of the related patterns. Based on intensive investigation, we abstract and propose a reference model for blockchain-based covert communication. We accordingly identify five types of covert communication patterns, each with different roles for covert senders and covert receivers, which enable one-to-one and one-to-many communication. Using Bitcoin as an example, we analyze the data distribution of covert channels within the block and transaction structure. Furthermore, we compare the hiding patterns and covert communication patterns and discuss the challenges and promising directions to achieve secure, robust, and cost-effective covert communication using blockchain. This work can provide valuable insights into the potential of blockchain technology for covert communication and lay the foundation for future research in this area. • We find seven types of hiding patterns with covert channels in blockchain. • We discover five covert communication patterns on blockchain for real-world scenarios. • We infer features of covert channels in Bitcoin and recommend hiding capacity for these channels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous studies have specifically demonstrated that incorporating high-quality side-information can notably enhance the steganographic security of JPEG images. To obtain more precise side-information estimates, researchers utilize sophisticated deblocking or denoising filters, which enhance security but require a substantial amount of time. The challenge lies in achieving a significant improvement in security and efficiency. This paper introduces a steganographic network named WTSNet, which leverages wavelet transform for estimating side-information through iterative optimization in both the pixel and wavelet domains. The wavelet domain is purposely designed to capture intricate high-frequency texture details and facilitate precise estimation of the side-information. Furthermore, the embedding cost is adjusted based on the polarity of the estimated rounding error, ensuring both secure and efficient performance. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed scheme substantially enhances the security of conventional JPEG steganography, which relies on additive distortion. Moreover, it outperforms the state-of-the-art JPEG steganography methods based on estimating side-information while consuming less time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A novel approach is presented in this paper for hiding the data using Fractional Grey Wolf Optimization. In this work, the key frames are extracted using the Structural Similarity Index measurement (SSIM). Then, individual key frames are subject to the formation of regions with the help of grid lines. The optimization algorithm is used to select the optimal region based on multi-objective cost function, namely energy, coverage, intensity and kurtosis. Simultaneously, the secret information is pre-processed with encryption to strengthen the security of the proposed method. And, finally, on the key frames Lifting Wavelet Transform (LWT) is applied to accomplish the wavelet coefficient frame to hide the secret information. With the help of metrics such as Peak Signal to Noise Ratio (PSNR), Embedding Capacity and Normalized Correlation (NC) the system performance is measured. Moreover, the proposed method obtained a maximal PSNR of 75.141 dB, and embedding capacity of 70.8% respectively to provide more security and higher imperceptibility for a decent video quality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Information security is one of the most important methods of protecting the confidentiality and privacy of internet users. The greater the volume of data, the more the need to increase the security methods for protecting data from intruders. This task can be challenging for researchers in terms of managing enormous data and maintaining their safety and effectiveness. Protection of digital content is a major issue in maintaining the privacy and secrecy of data. Toward this end, digital watermarking is based on the concept of information security through the insertion and detection of an embedded watermark in an efficient manner. Recent methodologies in the research on digital watermarking result in data distortion after embedding the watermark. This scenario can reduce the efficiency of detecting watermarks as well as violate data confidentiality. This study adapts a robust reversible histogram shifting (HS) technique for textual data in relational databases. Furthermore, the study presents a digital watermarking scheme intended for document copyright protection and proof of ownership. The major advantage of the proposed watermarking scheme is that it can protect digital data and preserve data quality. To the best of our knowledge, this research methodology is promising for use in the HS expansion model for watermarking data on nonnumeric databases. In addition, the results showed that despite exposing the database to an insertion attacks at 50% and 75% of the watermark, the proposed algorithm can recover more than half of the embedded watermark in all addition and alteration attacks cases. As a result, the watermark information can be retained and restored completely. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One of the significant techniques for hiding important information (such as text, image, and audio) is steganography. Steganography is used to keep this information as secret as possible, especially the sensitive ones after the massive expansion of data transmission through the Internet inside a conventional, non-secret, file, or message. This paper uses the American standard code for information interchange (ASCII) mapping technique (AMT) to hide the data in the color and grey image by converting it in a binary form, also convert the three levels of the red, green, and blue (RGB) image and grey image in the binary form, and then hide the data through hiding every two bits of the text in the two bits of one of the levels from the RGB image and grey image that means the text will be distributed throughout the images and allows hiding large amounts of data. That will send the information in a good securing way. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Quick response (QR) codes are currently the most commonly used 2D barcodes. They are composed of black and white modules, which detract from their aesthetic appeal. When printed, owing to the size, dot gain, and other printing conditions, barcode information is easily distorted, yielding poor recognition results. We present a systematic aesthetic QR code information embedding technique as well as an error analysis method for physically printed QR codes. QR code information is embedded in a cover image at different strengths and is then printed using two devices. Barcode information is recognized using a geometric transformation by locating and identifying information dots. We propose an adaptive algorithm that hides barcode information in a cover image given the barcode module identification error characteristics (false blacks and false whites). According to these error characteristics, we adaptively enhance the signal of the white embedded modules to improve the overall recognition ability. The experimental results show that the proposed method is compatible with current printing and output equipment. Judicious adjustment of the embedding strength of white module dots decreases the false-black recognition error caused by dot gain and yields small printed aesthetic QR codes that look better. This improves the decoding rates of aesthetic QR codes. We optimize the QR code embedding method and the reading ability given specified output device conditions. This study highlights the importance of the output conditions for integrated applications of aesthetic QR codes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]