StegFog: Distributed Steganography Applied to Cyber Resiliency in Multi Node Environments

Abstract

This paper presents a new study about the communication system named StegFog. It is based on applying distributed steganography linked with the concept of cyberfog security. The idea of cyberfog is to secure data by splitting it into numerous fragments and spreading them to end-user devices. The design of StegFog combines steganographic methods previously investigated by the Authors – StegHash and SocialSteg Disc. The reference design of the system is proposed and analyzed in terms of security, reliability, performance and timing. To prove the feasibility of the proposed solution, the prototype of StegFog was implemented, consisting of steganographic nodes operating over BitTorrent P2P networks with a hidden communication channel established by the multimedia files shared within it. Experiments were conducted for the implemented prototype to understand the basic features of the system, such as operational aspects of the address generator constructed using the modified StegHash method, timing of the basic methods within the system – reading, writing and notifying, steganographic rate of the system and overall security provided by the system. The presented results show how system such as StegFog aligned with the cyberfog security concept could be considered as the practical protection measure for secure network communications. The challenges and research directions to extend the concept are also discussed.