Robust Watermarking Research Articles

Region-Based Hybrid Medical Image Watermarking Scheme for Robust and Secured Transmission in IoMT

With the growth in Internet and digital technology, Internet of Medical Things (IoMT) and Telemedicine have become buzzwords in healthcare. A large number of medical images and information is shared through a public network in these applications. This paper proposes a region-based hybrid Medical Image Watermarking (MIW) scheme to ensure the authenticity, authorization, integrity, and confidentiality of the medical images transmitted through a public network in IoMT. In the proposed scheme, medical images are partitioned into Region of Interest (RoI) and Region of Non-Interest (RoNI). To ascertain integrity of RoI, tamper detection and recovery bits are embedded in RoI in the medical image. RoI is watermarked using adaptive Least Significant Bit (LSB) substitution with respect to the hiding capacity map for higher RoI imperceptibility and accuracy in tamper detection and recovery. Electronic Patient Record (EPR) is compressed using Huffman coding and encrypted using a pseudo-random key (secret key) to provide higher confidentiality and payload. QR code of hospital logo, Encrypted EPR, and RoI recovery bits are interleaved in RoNI using Discrete Wavelet Transform-Singular Value Decomposition (DWT-SVD) hybrid transforms to achieve a robust watermark. The proposed scheme is tested under various geometric and non-geometric attacks such as filtering, compression, rotation, salt and pepper noise and shearing. The evaluation results demonstrate that the proposed scheme has high imperceptibility, robustness, security, payload, tamper detection, and recovery accuracy under image processing attacks. Therefore, the proposed scheme can be used in the transmission of medical images and EPR in IoMT. Relevance of the proposed scheme is established by its superior performance in comparison to some of the popular existing schemes.

A Robust NIfTI Image Authentication Framework Based on DST and Multi-Scale Otsu Thresholding

Telemedicine has been intensely promoted in the present pandemic situation of COVID-19 to maintain a strategic distance from the infected person. Several medical tests were used to detect the coronavirus, including antigen, RT-PCR, and a lung CT scan. Only a lung CT-Scan can detect the coronavirus and provide information about the lung infection. As a result, digital imaging plays a critical role in the current pandemic situation. Teleradiology allows for the communication of digital medical images of patients over the internet for diagnosis. A lung CT-Scan test is currently being performed on billions of people to detect COVID-19. These images were sent via the internet for diagnosis and research purposes. The NIfTI image file (.nii extension) was created by the CT-Scanner and contains multiple slices of the lungs. As a result, radiologists determine that the received image has not been tempered during transmission, posing a critical authenticity problem when transmitting these images over the internet. As a result, the researchers are more concerned about the integrity and authenticity of these images in teleradiology. This paper proposes a blind, robust watermarking scheme for lung CT-Scan NIfTI images to address this issue. We use Otsu’s image segmentation algorithm in the proposed scheme to identify the slice with the least amount of medical information for watermark embedding. The proposed scheme employs the Discrete Shearlet Transform (DST), Lifting Wavelet Transform (LWT), and Schur decomposition to embed the encrypted watermark. Watermarks are encrypted using the Affine Transform. The experimental results show that watermarked slice has been tainted by the addition of various sorts of noise, including salt-and-pepper noise, compression, Gaussian noise, speckle noise, and motion blur. After an attack, a watermark is retrieved, and the NC values of extracted watermarks are 0.99623 for Salt and pepper noise, 0.96964 for Gaussian noise, 0.99014 for Speckle noise. The proposed scheme was put to the test with a variety of attacks and produced significant results.

Robust Watermarking Scheme for Encrypted Images Based on Scrambling and Kronecker Compressed Sensing

Data hiding in encrypted images (DHEI) embeds data in the cipher state, which not only protects the confidentiality of the cover image content, but also hides the existence of the secret information, and has a broad application prospect. However, many DHEI schemes pursue high capacity at the expense of robustness. In this letter, we propose a robust watermarking scheme for encrypted images based on scrambling and Kronecker compressed sensing (CS). The scheme makes full use of the encryption and compression characteristics of CS to realize the image encryption and preprocessing at the same time, and utilizes the democratic characteristic of CS, Most Significant Bits (MSBs) replacement, image global scrambling and adjusted uniform quantization to improve the robustness. In addition, the two-dimensional Kronecker CS reduces the computational complexity of the encoding end and increases the encoding efficiency. Experimental results show that our scheme achieves good robustness against various noise attacks and clipping attacks, while maintaining high-capacity embedding and stable recovery.

A novel convolution kernel-based robust watermarking scheme applied in medical image

A novel convolution kernel-based robust watermarking scheme applied in medical image

Twofold of algebraic decomposition method used for a watermarking scheme with $LWT$ over medical images

Mathematics has always been of great importance in various sciences, especially computer science. The mechanism used to embed various types of information in a host medical images to safeguard the privacy of the patient including the patient's name, doctor's digital signature is called watermarking. There are a lot of improved watermark algorithms, however, this information is susceptible to attack when the data are transferred over universal internet channels. This paper proposed a robust watermark algorithm that uses a Lifting Wavelet Transform $(LWT)$ and two times of the Hessenberg Matrix Decomposition Method $(HMDM)$ to embed a watermark in a chosen channel of the host image after performing the transform. The experimental results demonstrate that the improvement appears (higher robustness against $JPEG$ compression attack) and good imperceptibility against some attacks, to evaluate the fineness of the original with watermarked images and the extracted watermark respectively.

Smart-Fragile Authentication Scheme for Robust Detecting of Tampering Attacks on English Text

Content authentication, integrity verification, and tampering detection of digital content exchanged via the internet have been used to address a major concern in information and communication technology. In this paper, a text zero-watermarking approach known as Smart-Fragile Approach based on Soft Computing and Digital Watermarking (SFASCDW) is proposed for content authentication and tampering detection of English text. A first-level order of alphanumeric mechanism, based on hidden Markov model, is integrated with digital zero-watermarking techniques to improve the watermark robustness of the proposed approach. The researcher uses the first-level order and alphanumeric mechanism of Markov model as a soft computing technique to analyze English text. Moreover, he extracts the features of the interrelationship among the contexts of the text, utilizes the extracted features as watermark information, and validates it later with the studied English text to detect any tampering. SFASCDW has been implemented using PHP with VS code IDE. The robustness, effectiveness, and applicability of SFASCDW are proved with experiments involving four datasets of various lengths in random locations using the three common attacks, namely insertion, reorder, and deletion. The SFASCDW was found to be effective and could be applicable in detecting any possible tampering.

Watermarking of a 3D Model based on Wavelet Transform

In the last decade, 3D models gained interest in many applications, such as games, the medical field, and manufacture. It is necessary to protect these models from unauthorized copying, distribution, and editing. Digital watermarking is the best way to solve this problem. This paper introduces a robust watermarking method by embedding the watermark in the low-frequency domain, then selecting the coarsest level for embedding the watermark based on the strength factor. The invisibility of the watermark for the proposed algorithm is tested by using different measurements, such as HD and PSNR. The robustness was tested by using different types of attacks; the correlation coefficient was applied for the evaluation of the extracted watermark. From the results, it is clear that the proposed algorithm achieved good invisibility and robustness against the geometrical attack and the added noise.

Improved method of optimization-based ECG signal watermarking

We introduce a robust watermarking method to efficiently embed multiple marks into ECG signals using redundant discrete wavelet transform and generalized singular value decomposition. Multiple marks are embedded within the signal to eliminate any ownership conflict and provide copyright protection. The hybrid optimization technique is also used to balance the invisibility and robustness. Further, wavelet-based compression is adopted to compress the marked signal before transmission reduces the bandwidth demand. To evaluate the proposed algorithm, the standard ECG dataset is used. The proposed algorithm yields very good invisibility and robustness against several attacks, and it is also suitable for applications in the cloud.

A Novel Video Copyright Protection Scheme Based on Blockchain and Double Watermarking

With the continuous development of multimedia, more and more digital works such as videos are spread, stored, and used in the network. In recent years, digital copyright infringement disputes have occurred frequently. The traditional copyright protection system has some problems, such as difficulty confirming copyright, monitoring infringement, and obtaining evidence for rights protection. To this end, we have designed and implemented a novel video copyright protection scheme based on the blockchain and double watermarking technology. We use the image correlation coefficient method to extract video keyframes. And we combine with Contourlet Transform domain, QR decomposition, and SIFT algorithm to improve the robustness of watermark against geometric attacks on the premise of invisibility. After that, we use Arnold Transformation (Cat Map) based on the Maximum Entropy Threshold Segmentation to encrypt the robust watermark and strengthen the security. Moreover, based on the characteristics of the fragile watermarking, we accurately locate the attacked video’s tamper position and complete the integrity authentication of the watermarked video. In addition, the hash digest of the video watermark and the user ID of the copyright owner is signed by SM2 and uploaded to the blockchain. The user can register the copyright after passing the identity authentication. We conduct tests and security analysis on the blockchain performance of the system, the performance of the commercial cryptography algorithm, and the security of the watermarking system. The experimental results show that the blockchain used in this system conforms to the industry standard, the performance of SM2 and SM3 is better than ECC-256 and SHA-256, and the system security is well guaranteed.

Destroy the Robust Commercial Watermark via Deep Convolutional Encoder-Decoder Network

Nowadays, robust watermark is widely used to protect the copyright of multimedia. Robustness is the most important ability for watermark in application. Since the watermark attacking algorithm is a good way to promote the development of robust watermark, we proposed a new method focused on destroying the commercial watermark. At first, decorrelation and desynchronization are used as the preprocessing method. Considering that the train set of thousands of watermarked images is hard to get, we further use the Bernoulli sampling and dropout in network to achieve the training instance extension. The experiments show that the proposed network can effectively remove the commercial watermark. Meanwhile, the processed image can result in good quality that is almost as good as the original image.

A DCT Fractional Bit Replacement Based Dual Watermarking Algorithm for Image Authentication

Abstract: Watermarking is a process of embedding a message inside a digital signal like an image, video or text. It is used for several key reasons such as authenticity verification, ownership recognition and hidden communication. In this paper, we discuss about image watermarking, where secret messages are stored in images. Introduction: We propose a dual watermarking approach, which is based on Discrete Cosine Transform, Discrete Wavelet Transform and Singular Value Decomposition methods. This paper considers one watermark as robust and other water mark as fragile. Method: The robust watermark is embedded in Discrete Wavelet Transform- Singular Value Decomposition - domain and is used to transmit hidden messages. The fragile watermark is embedded in Discrete Cosine Transform domain and is used for verification of secret message of the robust watermark. The proposed algorithm is tested in the experimental results section and shows promising results against denoising, rotation, translation and cropping attacks. Result: The results show that the performance of the proposed algorithm in terms of mean squared error, structural similarity and peak signal to noise ratio is S4considerable as compared with the existing methods. Discussion: We present the comparison results with Himanshu et. al. in table 10, from which we can see that our method performs better with gaussian noise and rotational attack only lacking with Salt and Pepper noise. Fig. 7 and Fig. 8, in terms of resulting PSNR shows the variation of noise variance and degree of rotation. From the graphs it is evident that out method performs better against Gaussian and rotational attack. Conclusion: In this paper a dual watermarking method is proposed in which one watermark is fragile which is called as authentication watermark whereas the other watermark is robust and is called as the information watermark. The authentication watermark is embedded in the fractional part of DCT domain in the cover image and the information watermark is embedded in the diagonal vector of the LL sub-band.

LWT-DCT based Image Watermarking Scheme using Normalized SVD

Background: Nowadays information security is one of the biggest issues of social networks. The multimedia data can be tampered with, and the attackers can then claim its ownership. Image watermarking is a technique that is used for copyright protection and authentication of multimedia. Objective: We aim to create a new and more robust image watermarking technique to prevent illegal copying, editing and distribution of media. Method : The watermarking technique proposed in this paper is non-blind and employs Lifting Wavelet Transform on the cover image to decompose the image into four coefficient matrices. Then Discrete Cosine Transform is applied which separates a selected coefficient matrix into different frequencies and later Singular Value Decomposition is applied. Singular Value Decomposition is also applied to the watermarking image and it is added to the singular matrix of the cover image which is then normalized followed by the inverse Singular Value Decomposition, inverse Discrete Cosine Transform and inverse Lifting Wavelet Transform respectively to obtain an embedded image. Normalization is proposed as an alternative to the traditional scaling factor. Results: Our technique is tested against attacks like rotation, resizing, cropping, noise addition and filtering. The performance comparison is evaluated based on Peak Signal to Noise Ratio, Structural Similarity Index Measure, and Normalized Cross-Correlation. Conclusion: The experimental results prove that the proposed method performs better than other state-of-the-art techniques and can be used to protect multimedia ownership.

Congruence and geometric feature-based commutative encryption-watermarking method for vector maps

The commutative encryption-watermarking (CEW), in which the encryption and watermarking are distinct and commutative, has become a promising method for protecting data security. For vector maps, current methods combine encryption with watermarking directly, but cannot satisfy the CEW properties. For example, the watermark embedding and encryption are not commutative and lack flexibility. Considering the essential characteristics of vector maps, this paper proposes a CEW method based on the congruence relationship and geometric feature for vector maps. In the proposed CEW method, the angles and the distance ratios are selected as the geometric features which provide separate spaces for cryptography and watermarking operations. They are encrypted by making the original values and encrypted values congruent. At the same time, the watermark is embedded into their residue. As the residue keeps invariant under congruence operations, the watermark can be extracted from either the plaintext or the ciphertext. Experiments are conducted to verify the commutativity between encryption and watermarking. Besides, the superiority in terms of watermark robustness and capacity of the proposed method has been also compared with other encryption-combining-watermarking methods for vector maps.

LRW-CRDB: Lossless Robust Watermarking Scheme for Categorical Relational Databases

In 2002, Agrawal and Kiernan defined six basic requirements, including preventing illegal watermark embedding and authentication, reversibility, robustness, and others, which must be satisfied when a reversible watermark is designed for relational databases. To meet these requirements, in this paper, a lossless watermarking scheme for a categorical relational database called LRW-CRDB (lossless robust watermarking for categorical relational databases) is proposed. In our LRW-CRDB scheme, the database owner needs to generate two secret embedding keys, K1 and K2, in advance. Then, two reference sets are generated based on two different secret embedding keys and a symmetry-based data hiding strategy, and then these are used for the watermark embedding phases. Experimental results confirmed that our LRW-CRDB scheme successfully detects 100% of hidden watermarks, even when more than 95% of the watermarked relational database has been deleted. In other words, the robustness of our proposed LRW-CRDB scheme outperforms other existing schemes under a variety of possible attacks, such as alteration, sorting, deletion, and mix-match attacks.

Robust and Blind Audio Watermarking Scheme Based on Genetic Algorithm in Dual Transform Domain

In order to protect the copyright of audio media in cyberspace, a robust and blind audio watermarking scheme based on the genetic algorithm (GA) is proposed in a dual transform domain. A formula for calculating the embedding depth is developed, and two embedding depths with different values are used to represent the “1” and “0” states of the binary watermark, respectively. In the extracting process, the embedding depth in each audio fragment will be calculated and compared with the average embedding depth to determine the watermark bit by bit, so this scheme can blindly extract the watermark without the original audio. GA will be applied to optimize the algorithm parameters for meeting the performance requirements in different applications. Besides, the embedding rule is further optimized to enhance the transparency based on the principle of minimal modification to the audio. Experimental results prove that the payload capacity reaches 172.27 bps, the bit error rate (BER) is 0.1% under the premise that its transparency is higher than 25 dB, and its robustness is strong against many attacks. Significantly, this scheme can adaptively select the algorithm parameters to satisfy the specific performance requirements.

DT CWT and Schur decomposition based robust watermarking algorithm to geometric attacks

DT CWT and Schur decomposition based robust watermarking algorithm to geometric attacks

Robust and Secure Zero-Watermarking Algorithm for Medical Images Based on Harris-SURF-DCT and Chaotic Map

To protect the patient information in medical images, this article proposes a robust watermarking algorithm for medical images based on Harris-SURF-DCT. First, the corners of the medical image are extracted using the Harris corner detection algorithm, and then, the previously extracted corners are described using the method of describing feature points in the SURF algorithm to generate the feature descriptor matrix. Then, the feature descriptor matrix is processed through the perceptual hash algorithm to obtain the feature vector of the medical image, which is a binary feature vector with a size of 32 bits. Secondly, to enhance the security of the watermark information, the logistic map algorithm is used to encrypt the watermark before embedding the watermark. Finally, with the help of cryptography knowledge, third party, and zero-watermarking technology, the algorithm can embed the watermark without modifying the medical image. When extracting the watermark, the algorithm can extract the watermark from the test image without the original image. In addition, the algorithm has strong robustness to conventional attacks and geometric attacks. Especially under geometric attacks, the algorithm performs better.

A Hybrid Robust Image Watermarking Method Based on DWT-DCT and SIFT for Copyright Protection.

In this paper, a robust hybrid watermarking method based on discrete wavelet transform (DWT), discrete cosine transform (DCT), and scale-invariant feature transformation (SIFT) is proposed. Indeed, it is of prime interest to develop robust feature-based image watermarking schemes to withstand both image processing attacks and geometric distortions while preserving good imperceptibility. To this end, a robust watermark is embedded in the DWT-DCT domain to withstand image processing manipulations, while SIFT is used to protect the watermark from geometric attacks. First, the watermark is embedded in the middle band of the discrete cosine transform (DCT) coefficients of the HL1 band of the discrete wavelet transform (DWT). Then, the SIFT feature points are registered to be used in the extraction process to correct the geometric transformations. Extensive experiments have been conducted to assess the effectiveness of the proposed scheme. The results demonstrate its high robustness against standard image processing attacks and geometric manipulations while preserving a high imperceptibility. Furthermore, it compares favorably with alternative methods.

Evaluation of digital watermarking on subjective speech quality

New methods of securing the distribution of audio content have been widely deployed in the last twenty years. Their impact on perceptive quality has, however, only been seldomly the subject of recent extensive research. We review digital speech watermarking state of the art and provide subjective testing of watermarked speech samples. Latest speech watermarking techniques are listed, with their specifics and potential for further development. Their current and possible applications are evaluated. Open-source software designed to embed watermarking patterns in audio files is used to produce a set of samples that satisfies the requirements of modern speech-quality subjective assessments. The patchwork algorithm that is coded in the application is mainly considered in this analysis. Different watermark robustness levels are used, which allow determining the threshold of detection to human listeners. The subjective listening tests are conducted following ITU-T P.800 Recommendation, which precisely defines the conditions and requirements for subjective testing. Further analysis tries to determine the effects of noise and various disturbances on watermarked speech’s perceived quality. A threshold of intelligibility is estimated to allow further openings on speech compression techniques with watermarking. The impact of language or social background is evaluated through an additional experiment involving two groups of listeners. Results show significant robustness of the watermarking implementation, retaining both a reasonable net subjective audio quality and security attributes, despite mild levels of distortion and noise. Extended experiments with Chinese listeners open the door to formulate a hypothesis on perception variations with geographical and social backgrounds.

MPEG and DA-AD Resilient DCT-Based Video Watermarking Using Adaptive Frame Selection

We present a robust video watermarking scheme and report the detailed robustness of the video watermarking assessed based on standard criteria obtained from Information Hiding and its Criteria (IHC) Committee. Using discrete cosine transform domain spread-spectrum watermarking, our system achieves robustness under various non-hostile video processing techniques, including MPEG compression and digital/analog–analog/digital (DA-AD) conversion. The proposed system ensures that a 16-bit embedded sequence can be extracted through adaptive frame selection in any 15-s interval, even with a long video clip. To evaluate the performance of the proposed watermarking scheme, we conducted robustness tests under a DA-AD conversion environment, based on the MPEG-4 part 10 (H.264) codec. The experiment results obtained indicate that, in addition to being robust against non-hostile video processes, the proposed method achieves invisibility. The assessment of the developed watermarking scheme also satisfies the third edition of the IHC video watermarking evaluation criteria.