A New Steganography Method for Dynamic GIF Images Based on Palette Sort

Jingzhi Lin,Guorui Feng,Xinpeng Zhang,Zichi Wang,Zhenxing Qian

doi:10.1155/2020/8812087

Jingzhi Lin, Guorui Feng + Show 3 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1155/2020/8812087

Copy DOI

Abstract

This paper proposes a new steganography method for hiding data into dynamic GIF (Graphics Interchange Format) images. When using the STC framework, we propose a new algorithm of cost assignment according to the characteristics of dynamic GIF images, including the image palette and the correlation of interframes. We also propose a payload allocation algorithm for different frames. First, we reorder the palette of GIF images to reduce the modifications on pixel values when modifying the index values. As the different modifications on index values would result in different impacts on pixel values, we assign the elements with less impact on pixel values with small embedding costs. Meanwhile, small embedding costs are also assigned for the elements in the regions that the interframe changes are large enough. Finally, we calculate an appropriate payload for each frame using the embedding probability obtained from the proposed distortion function. Experimental results show that the proposed method has a better security performance than state-of-the-art works.

Highlights

Stenography is technology that hides secret data into covers for covert transmission [1]
Some spatial image distortion functions can be used for JPEG images by allocating the embedding costs for the coefficients obtained from the inverse
We propose a new algorithm of cost assignment for dynamic GIF images by combining the characteristics of dynamic GIF image palette and the inter frames

Summary

A New Steganography Method for Dynamic GIF Images Based on Palette Sort

Jingzhi Lin ,1 Zhenxing Qian ,2,3 Zichi Wang, Xinpeng Zhang, and Guorui Feng. Received 1 June 2020; Revised 29 July 2020; Accepted 5 August 2020; Published 28 August 2020. This paper proposes a new steganography method for hiding data into dynamic GIF (Graphics Interchange Format) images. When using the STC framework, we propose a new algorithm of cost assignment according to the characteristics of dynamic GIF images, including the image palette and the correlation of interframes. We reorder the palette of GIF images to reduce the modifications on pixel values when modifying the index values. As the different modifications on index values would result in different impacts on pixel values, we assign the elements with less impact on pixel values with small embedding costs. Small embedding costs are assigned for the elements in the regions that the interframe changes are large enough. We calculate an appropriate payload for each frame using the embedding probability obtained from the proposed distortion function. Experimental results show that the proposed method has a better security performance than state-of-the-art works

Introduction

Preliminary

Proposed Method

Experimental Results

Conclusions