Robust wavelet-based video watermarking scheme for copyright protection using the human visual system

Abstract

The development of the information technology and computer networks facilitates easy duplication, manipulation, and distribution of digital data. Digital watermarking is one of the proposed solutions for effectively safeguarding the rightful ownership of digital images and video. We propose a public digital watermarking technique for video copyright protection in the discrete wavelet transform domain. The scheme uses binary images as watermarks. These are embedded in the detail wavelet coefficients of the middle wavelet subbands. The method is a combination of spread spectrum and quantization-based watermarking. Every bit of the watermark is spread over a number of wavelet coefficients with the use of a secret key by means of quantization. The selected wavelet detail coefficients from different subbands are quantized using an optimal quantization model, based on the characteristics of the human visual system (HVS). Our HVS-based scheme is compared to a non-HVS approach. The resilience of the watermarking algorithm is tested against a series of different spatial, temporal, and compression attacks. To improve the robustness of the algorithm, we use error correction codes and embed the watermark with spatial and temporal redundancy. The proposed method achieves a good perceptual quality and high resistance to a large spectrum of attacks.