Color image encryption scheme based on alternate quantum walk and controlled Rubik’s Cube

Abstract Aiming at solving the trouble that digital image information is easily intercepted and tampered during transmission, we proposed a color image encryption scheme based on alternate quantum random walk and controlled Rubik’s Cube transformation. At the first, the color image is separated into three channels: channel R, channel G and channel B. Besides, a random sequence is generated by alternate quantum walk. Then the six faces of the Rubik’s Cube are decomposed and arranged in a specific order on a two-dimensional plane, and each pixel of the image is randomly mapped to the Rubik’s Cube. The whirling of the Rubik’s Cube is controlled by a random sequence to realize image scrambling and encryption. The scrambled image acquired by Rubik’s Cube whirling and the random sequence received by alternate quantum walk are bitwise-XORed to obtain a single-channel encrypted image. Finally the three-channel image is merged to acquire the final encrypted image. The decryption procedure is the reverse procedure of the encryption procedure. The key space of this scheme is theoretically infinite. After simulation experiments, the information entropy after encryption reaches 7.999, the NPCR is 99.5978%, and the UACI is 33.4317%. The encryption scheme with high robustness and security has a excellent encryption effect which is effective to resist statistical attacks, force attacks, and other differential attacks.