PRNU-Based Camera Attribution From Multiple Seam-Carved Images

Abstract

Photo response non-uniformity (PRNU) noise-based source attribution is a well-known technique to verify the camera of an image or video. Researchers have proposed various countermeasures to prevent PRNU-based source camera attribution. Forced seam-carving is one such recently proposed counter forensics technique. This technique can disable PRNU-based source camera attribution by forcefully removing seams such that the size of most uncarved image blocks is less than $50 \times 50$ pixels. In this paper, we show that given multiple seam-carved images from the same camera, source attribution can still be possible even if the size of uncarved blocks in the image is less than the recommended size of $50 \times 50$ pixels. Theoretical analysis and experiments with multiple cameras demonstrate that the effectiveness of our scheme depends on the number of seams carved from an image and the randomness of the seam positions.