Multicarrier spread spectrum watermarking for secure error concealment in fading channel

Abstract

This paper proposes a novel multicarrier spread spectrum (SS) watermarking scheme for the application of image error concealment using multicarrier-code division multiple access (MC-CDMA) with binary phase shift keying (BPSK) transmission in Rayleigh fading channel. The goal is achieved by embedding important information (image digest) which is extracted from the original image itself, and is used to introduce sufficient redundancy in the transmitted image. Half-toning technique is applied to obtain image digest from its low-resolution version. At the decoder side, data demodulation as well as watermark decoding are done using minimum mean square error combining (MMSEC) strategy. The extracted image digest is used to correct the damaged regions. The integration of SS watermarking with the existing SS modulation not only simplifies the design but also offers significant performance improvement for error concealment in fading channel. Authorized users having the knowledge of code patterns for SS watermarking can only perform the error concealment operation and the method is secured. Experimental results duly support the effectiveness of the proposed scheme.