Digital Watermarking Method Research Articles

Artificial bee colony based perceptually tuned blind color image watermarking in hybrid LWT-DCT domain

A perceptually tuned blind digital watermarking method for color images in a hybrid lifting wavelet transform (LWT) and discrete cosine transform (DCT) domain is proposed in this work. The color watermark is scrambled by arnold transform before embedding to enhance the security level. The color host image is firstly transformed by lifting wavelet transform and the approximate sub-band is partitioned into different blocks each of size 8 x 8. The pixel values of each block are quantized using a quantization table. Each quantized-block is further decomposed by the DCT, to generate the AC coefficient matrix. Scrambled watermark is thereafter inserted into the AC coefficient matrix using the perceptually tuned dynamic embedding strength factor. The visual quality and robustness of the proposed watermarking are balanced by optimizing the value of perceptually tuned strength factor by the Artificial bee colony (ABC) optimization algorithm. Experimental results show that the color watermark is undetectable (with CPSNR > 40 dB) into the host image and robust enough (with NC > 0.9) to resist the image processing and manipulation attacks. Comparison analysis with other related watermarking methods highlights the efficacy of the proposed work.

A robust digital watermarking method for depth-image-based rendering 3D video

Depth-image-based rendering (DIBR) has become an accessible rendering technology for 3D video. A variety of digital watermarking methods have been proposed to protect the copyright of DIBR 3D video works. However, the robustness and imperceptibility of the existing methods need to be improved. Therefore, we apply the DIBR rendering features to propose a watermarking method to enhance the watermarking effect. First, to improve the robustness, we combine the DIBR rendering rules to construct steady feature data as the selection criterion of watermark embedding position. We detect the scale invariable feature transformation (SIFT) feature points from centre views and match them in every two adjacent views. Each two matched feature points construct one matching vector. The gradient-probability distributions of the vectors are used as the feature data to determine the watermark embedding position. Thus, the embedding positions are robust to the affine transformation and geometric attacks, and the watermark robustness improved. Second, to improve the imperceptibility, we design a joint watermark extraction strategy based on the similarity of the rendered left and right images. The watermark data are embedded into the centre view with low embedding strength and jointly extracted from the left and right images. This strategy guarantees the extraction accuracy while reducing the impact of watermark embedding on the original centre view. Experimental data show that the proposed method has good robustness and imperceptibility.

Цифровое маркирование аудиосигналов, основанное на модуляции MCLT-коэффициентов

Audio data hiding techniques have various applications such as audio watermarking and steganography. This article provides a brief description of a new method of digital audio watermarking that has been developed based on a modulated complex lapped transform (MCLT). The new audio watermarking algorithm saves the sound quality of the marked signals. The experimental results show the dependence of the sound quality of the marked audio signal on the parameters of the marking method. Moreover, the results of the experiments show the influence of various attacks on the marked audio signal. Based on conducted experiments, it is concluded that the new method of digital audio watermarking can be used to confirm the authenticity of audio files distributed through the Internet or to confirm the integrity of the transmitted audio files.

Digital Watermarking for Anonymized Data With Low Information Loss

At present, massive amounts of data are utilized for artificial intelligence technologies such as machine learning and deep learning. However, these data must be utilized carefully while preserving data privacy. Data anonymization is a technique enabling both data mining and privacy protection, preventing the identification of individuals by generalizing the data to include multiple records with the same values. In this study, we consider a data-publishing infrastructure for personal data sharing. The infrastructure anonymizes data prior to publishing it to users for privacy protection; however, the problem of unauthorized republishing by malicious users must be considered. To address this issue, we studied digital watermarking methods that correlate data users with anonymized data. Our previous method embedded information indicating the original user to detect illegally republished data. However, this method did not focus on information loss. This study proposes another digital watermarking method for anonymized data that achieves low information loss. The proposed method replaces values in tuples to embed information. To reduce the information loss caused by the embedding, the proposed method selects replacement values from the candidates whose meanings are similar to the original. We propose the use of vector-conversion tables to select replacement values. The proposed method also extends the maximum length of the embedded bit string by embedding multiple bits into a single tuple. Moreover, we measured the tolerance to distortion attacks to evaluate the efficacy of the proposed method. The proposed method is non-blind, i.e., data prior to digital watermarking is required to perform extraction.

Digital Watermarking of Compressed Videos Using Larger Dimension 2D Error Correcting Codes for Higher Embedding Capacity

This paper proposes a novel method of digital watermarking of MPEG videos using 2-dimensional error-correcting codes (2D ECC). The motion vectors of the video to be protected are used as the cover....

Digital Watermarking Method for Printed Matters Using Deep Learning for Detecting Watermarked Areas

Digital Watermarking Method for Printed Matters Using Deep Learning for Detecting Watermarked Areas

VLSI Implementation and Software Co-Simulation of Digital Image Watermarking with Increased Security

Background: Security is one of the fundamental and essential factors, which has to be addressed in the field of communication. Communication refers to the exchange of useful information between two or more nodes. Sometimes it is required to exchange some of the confidential information such as a company’s logo, which needs to be hidden from the third person. The data that is being exchanged between these nodes has to be kept confidential and secured from unintended users. The three fundamental components of security are confidentiality, integrity and authentication. The data that is being exchanged has to be confidential, and only the authorized party should have access to the information that is being exchanged. One of the key methods for securing the data is encryption. Objective: The main objective of this paper was to address the problem of data hiding and security in communication systems. There is a need for having hardware resources for having high speed data security and protection. Methods: In this paper, we implemented image watermarking using LSB technique to hide a secret image, and employed encryption using Advanced Encryption Standard, to enhance the security of the image. An image is a two dimensional signal, with each pixel value representing the intensity level. The secure transmission of the image along the channel is a challenging task, because of the reason that, any individual can access it, if no security measures are taken. Conclusion: An efficient method of digital watermarking has been implemented with increased security and performance parameters are presented. Results: In this paper, hardware realization of image watermarking/encryption and dewatermarking/ decryption is implemented using Very Large Scale Integration. The design is verified by means of co-simulation using MATLAB and Xilinx. The paper also presents the performance parameters of the design, with respect to speed, area and power.

A digital watermarking method based on NSCT transform and hybrid evolutionary algorithms with neural networks

This study aims to determine the watermark resistance to different attacks as well as the PSNR level, both of which are essential requirements of watermarking. In our research, we came up with an intelligent design based on NSCT-SVD that fulfills these requirements to a great extent and we managed to use different-sized images for watermark instead of using logos on the host images. Yet we were able to improve PSNR levels and resistance to various attacks. In this paper an NSCT-SVD-based smart watermark model is proposed. We first compare the PSO and PSO-GA algorithms for greater stability using larger SFs obtained by the PSO-GA-AI algorithm. The resulting host image is then decomposed by NSCT transform to obtain images below the low frequency range. Stationary Wavelet Transform (SWT) is performed once on these coefficients and the low frequency coefficients are fed to SVD. Afterwards, SWT transform is performed on the watermark image and the transform is once again taken from the HL coefficients and the LL frequencies are given to the SVD conversion. The rest of image process is insertion. This insertion process dramatically increases the visual transparency and PSNR value. The experiment shows that such a model is able to resist the repeated image attacks with better visibility and power. These results are compared before and after using SWT. We have used a PSO-based algorithm for better results on the False Positive rate in the embedding phase.

A New Digital Watermark Algorithm Based on Granular Computing

Granular and Granular computing has become a hot research topic. Granular computing can be applied to information processing, image processing and knowledge discovery and so on. But little research has been directed toward digital watermark based on Granular computing. For a binary image, a granule is made up of pixels which have the same pixel value. For a gray image, it may have two or more granules according to its pixel values. We divide the gray image into lots of granules by intervals. So in this paper, we propose a kind of new digital watermarking algorithm based on granular and granular computing. A binary image is adopted as a watermark, and we embed it in a gray image. We devise an embedding algorithm and an extraction algorithm based on granular computing. The experiment results show that the method of digital watermark based on granular and granular computing is robust to resist noise and cropped attack, and sensitive to jpeg attack.

A robust watermarking method for MPEG-4 SLS audio

Audio lossless compression technology has been widely used to provide customers with higher quality music works. The protection of these works becomes very important. However, there are few digital watermarking methods specifically for lossless compressed audio, and the features of the lossless codec have not been used to improve the performance of watermarking. In this research, we propose a robust audio watermarking method to protect the music encoded by MPEG-4 SLS (Scalable Lossless Coding) format and improve the watermark security and robustness in two aspects. We design an adaptive selection method for watermark embedding position to enhance the security. The significant states combinations of consecutive scale factor-bands (SFB) are constructed as the feature data to determine the embedding target SFB. In this way, the embedding SFB adaptively changes with the audio signal variation, so the security improves. Based on the feature of the MPEG-4 SLS codec, we design new watermark embedding and extraction methods to improve the robustness. The watermark data are embedded into the target SFB. Meanwhile, the embedding is achieved through changing the probability distributions of Bit-plane coding results, which is stable when the audio faces attacks. The watermark data are extracted by comparing the probability distributions before and after embedding. The probability distributions are stable under attacks, so the robustness improves. The experimental data show that the proposed method can resist conventional signal processing attacks while guaranteeing the imperceptibility.

DCT-based color digital image blind watermarking method with variable steps

In this paper, a blind watermarking method for color digital image based on DCT domain with variable steps is proposed to solve the copyright protection of color digital image. In this method, partial DCT coefficients of the image block transformed by two-dimensional discrete cosine transform (2D-DCT) are selected in the transform domain firstly, then these selected DCT coefficients at different positions are quantized by different quantization steps, and the embedding and blind extraction of digital watermark are completed. This method used color digital image as watermark image instead of gray image or binary image, and the color host image used in this scheme is selected from two public image databases (CVG-UGR and USC-SIPI). The experimental result shows that this scheme embedded color digital image watermark into host image successfully not merely has high invisibility, but also has strong robustness, which is suitable for digital image copyright protection.

Analysis of Digital Image Watermarking Techniques through Hybrid Methods

Digital image watermarking is an attractive research area since it protects the multimedia data from unauthorized access. For designing an efficient and robust digital image watermarking system, the trade-off among imperceptibility, robustness, capacity, and security must be maintained. Various studies regarding this concern have been performed to ensure these requirements by hybridizing different domains, such as spatial and transform domains. In this paper, we have presented an analytical study of the existing hybrid digital image watermarking methods. At first, we have given a standard framework for designing a hybrid method that ensures the basic design requirements of watermarking for various applications. After a brief literature review, we compared and analyzed the complexity of several existing hybrid methods in a tabular form. The limitations and applications of these methods are also highlighted. Finally, we summarized the challenges of the existing methods and concluded the study by giving future research directions.

Efficient Management of Ultrasound Images using Digital Watermarking

Nowadays, the administration of medical images can be compromised by several information security issues. Among others, a first problem consists in authenticating the source that originated the medical image and verifying that it corresponds to the correct patient; a second problem is aimed to avoid detachment between an electronic patient record and its corresponding images. A promising solution is the use of digital watermarking techniques applied to medical images considering in the design requirements of imperceptibility-robustness of the field of medical imaging. In this paper a digital watermarking method for an efficient administration of ultrasound images is proposed. To avoid the detachment between the record and images, we use an invisible watermarking in the frequency domain of the image. To authenticate the source of origin of the medical image, we use a visible-imperceptible watermarking in the spatial domain of the image. The experimental results show an efficient robustness and imperceptibility of the embedded watermark signals into the medical image. A comparison of performance with related works previously reported in the literature is included.

A discrete wavelet transform and singular value decomposition-based digital video watermark method

Digital video watermark is widely used to protect copyright and content authentication. DWT-SVD based method, i.e., discrete wavelet transform (DWT) and singular value decomposition (SVD) based method, is one of the most popular state-of-the-art methods. There are two main criteria to evaluate it, i.e., imperceptibility and robustness. The former is measured via the peak signal to noise ratio (PSNR) and structural similarity (SSIM). They should be as high as possible after the watermark is embedded. Robustness measures how easy to restore the embedded watermark by the owner even if the watermarked video is damaged by an outside attacker. Current studies randomly choose embedded positions for watermark, which hardly achieves its highest imperceptibility and robustness. In this paper, we propose a more imperceptible and robust digital video watermarking method than the existing one. First, we introduce a method to measure video frame distortion in a wavelet transform domain. Second, we model the problem to achieve the minimum video frame distortion as an optimization problem, i.e., choose embedded positions that can maximize peak signal to noise ratio. Finally, we evaluate and compare our method with the state-of-the-art approaches by using real experiments and show its advantages in both imperceptibility and robustness.

A self-recovery watermarking scheme based on block truncation coding and quantum chaos map

To take into account the invisibility, recovery quality, detection ability, and security, a new digital image fragile watermarking method based on block truncation coding (BTC) and quantum chaos map is proposed. In this method generates the authentication watermark for each 4 × 4 block and generates the recovery watermark for each 2 × 2 block by block truncation coding. For each block, the block truncation coding is used to classify the image blocks into smooth blocks and rough blocks. For different blocks, recovery data can be generated by allocating fewer bits to the smooth blocks and more bits to the rough blocks to encoding the block content. Quantum chaos map is used to generate the block mapping sequence for embedding recovery watermark to improve the shortcoming of watermarking such as small keyspace and low security. The experimental results show that the proposed scheme improves the quality of watermarked and recovered images. Additionally, this approach achieves higher security than the existing methods, under different attacks, such as general tampering, collage attack, content-only, and a hybrid attack.

Digital Watermarking Properties, Classification and Techniques

The rise in the demand for multimedia digital products has led to significant copyright challenges, which concerns proof of ownership and copy control. Digital watermarking method provides a solution to the problems associated to copyright protection and control. Considerable quantities of multimedia content are printed, edited or distributed unlawfully without the legal consent of the owner. Digital piracy in the movie and music industry contributes to severe economic losses annually. The problem of digital piracy has led to the urgent need for digital watermarking as a method to counter the piracy. The protection of digital content is currently the main responsibility of the content owner since piracy is evident in all levels of multimedia industry. Therefore, for multimedia information, protection of content copyright has increasingly become the sole focus of the content owner. Digital watermarking is a vital technology, which is applicable in protecting the contemporary multimedia digital contents..

РОЗРОБКА СИСТЕМИ ВБУДОВИ ЦИФРОВИХ ВОДЯНИХ ЗНАКІВ В ЗОБРАЖЕННЯ НА ОСНОВІ DCT-LWT-SVD

Copyright protection of digital content is a rather actual problem of humanity in the 21st century. Misuses of multimedia content is very common, and their number is growing with each passing day. One type of copyright protection is the embedding of digital watermark (DW) in the content. In this paper a new method of embedding digital watermark into image using discrete cosine transform, lifting wavelet transform (LWT) with maternal wavelet "Dobeshi-8" and singular coefficients decomposition is proposed. Embedding is performed into the first singular number of the low frequency wavelet transform region. As a digital watermark, we will use a grayscale image normalized to a range from zero to ten to provide a high peak signal-to-noise ratio (PSNR). The research analyzed the developed method: the method of embedding and detecting information was tested for its resistance to various types of attacks, namely: application of noise overlay (Gauss and pulse noise, "salt and pepper"), "unsharp" filter and median filter, and compression attack (with quality coefficients for a complete container from 60 to 100). As a result of the conducted testing, it was established that the method is quite resistant to all the attacks, except for the "unsharp" filtering (the resulting performance is not satisfactory). The method showed good results in peak signal-to-noise ratio - the average PSNR value is 50.5 dB, as well as high rates of similarity between the embedded DW and the extracted one - from 77% to 97.6% while saving the full container in a lossless format, and up to 53, 05 dB and 91.96% while saving the image in a lossless format (JPEG).

Ensuring the functional reliability of computer linguistic stegosystems in context of countering the information propaganda

The article reviews the existing methods for improving the functional reliability of computer linguistic stegosystems. Since it was found during the study that quantum steganography is promising direction, especially in the context of counteracting the information propaganda, therefore these approaches are the ones that are considered for solving the problem. The analysis of existing developments proves the lack of a full-fledged practical implementation of such an approach in steganography. An assumption is put forward in the work that the reason is in absence of unity of the corpuscular-wave characteristics in the process of hiding the stegomessage. It is being proved in the article that at the moment such an approach can only be realized in computer linguistic steganography, by combining it with quantum steganography. The analysis found that textual steganography basing on quantum laws is at the initial stage of development, and studies are conducted only in the field of random interval methods. The concept of quantum-semantic linguistic steganography is introduced to solve the problem in the work. Existing disadvantages of quantum steganography methods, namely, the inability to reproduce the plurality of worlds or the text's vulnerability to systems of automatic semantic modification, are proposed to be corrected by using the method of linguistic-combinatorial modeling of difficult-formalized systems and the principles of cybernetic hermeneutics for interaction with quantum states, and intensional logic to solve the problem of quantum entanglement to save quantum dualism for the formalization and implementation of the idea of the quantum-semantic steganography in practice. In turn, the implementation of affine transformations in relation to the function describing the subjective semantic line of the text will provide a process of counteracting the information propaganda. The use of the digital watermarking methods for decryption the change of semantic states in formation of the text by subjective semantic line will help to reduce the probability of detecting the fact of the stegomessage transmission.

Hybrid Mode of Medical Image Watermarking To Enhance Robustness and Imperceptibility

In Modern healthcare systems, diagnostic information of patients is managed digitally. Watermarking strategies plays a significant role to ensure the security, authenticity and management of biomedical images and related patient information. This paper explores different invisible Digital watermarking methods both in spatial and transform / frequency domain and then Hybrid method by combining two techniques to justify better results for medical images. Here, host image considered is a medical image and patient’s information is a watermark which is embedded into it. The embedded watermark is hidden in medical host image and its quality should not be degraded to avoid misdiagnosis by doctors. In this paper, LSB, SVD, DCT, DWT and Hybrid techniques (DWT+SVD) are implemented for embedding and extraction process of invisible medical image watermarking. The performance is evaluated based on PSNR as a measure of imperceptibility and CRC & SSIM as a check of robustness. The attacks introduced are cropping, rotating, and noise like Gaussian, Salt & Paper, Speckle and Poisson. Results reveal that DWT provides higher PSNR values but it is robust for few attacks only. On the other side, SVD provides consistent SSIM for all attacks, although PSNR values are less than that of DWT. Hence a hybrid technique is implemented by incorporating benefits of DWT and SVD both and achieved optimal values of PSNR as well as SSIM to provide better security to medical images by preserving the quality as well.

A Highly Secure and Robust Copyright Protection Method for Grayscale Images using DWT-SVD

Digital watermarking has emerged as a potential solution to copyright-related issues of digital data. A novel, highly secure robust digital watermarking method using DWT-SVD is presented in this paper. Instead of using the conventional watermark embedding process where the watermark gets embedded over the entire host image, the coefficients for embedding the watermark inside the host image has been identified in this proposed method. Such selection of pixels used for insertion of watermark makes this algorithm highly secure, robust, and imperceptible. The experimental results demonstrate the efficiency of the proposed method in aspects of high robustness and good imperceptibility.