Watermark Embedding Scheme Research Articles

A chaotic hierarchical encryption/watermark embedding scheme for multi-medical images based on row–column confusion and closed-loop bi-directional diffusion

Security during remote transmission has been an important concern for researchers in recent years. In this paper, a hierarchical encryption multi-image encryption scheme for people with different security levels is designed, and a multi-image encryption (MIE) algorithm with row and column confusion and closed-loop bi-directional diffusion is adopted in the paper. While ensuring secure communication of medical image information, people with different security levels have different levels of decryption keys, and differentiated visual effects can be obtained by using the strong sensitivity of chaotic keys. The highest security level can obtain decrypted images without watermarks, and at the same time, patient information and copyright attribution can be verified by obtaining watermark images. The experimental results show that the scheme is sufficiently secure as an MIE scheme with visualized differences and the encryption and decryption efficiency is significantly improved compared to other works.

3D Copyright Protection Based on Binarized Computational Ghost Imaging Encryption and Cellular Automata Transform

In this paper, a watermark embedding scheme based on ghost image encryption and cellular automata transformation is proposed. In this scheme, the watermark forms speckle through different light intensities into a key, and the cellular automata transformation algorithm is embedded into the 3D image. Compared with the traditional watermarking encryption method, this scheme combines ghost imaging and the cellular automata transformation algorithm, which double guarantees and increases the confidentiality of the watermark. The binary computing ghost imaging discussed in this paper saves the storage space of password text and makes the transmission of password text more convenient and faster. Experiments on this method also verify that the watermark-embedded image has higher imperceptibility and higher robustness against attacks, and that the extracted watermark has good integrity.

A robust hybrid digital watermarking technique against a powerful CNN-based adversarial attack

Digital watermarking techniques are valuable tools to embed digital signatures on multimedia content to establish the legal ownership and authenticity claims by the owners. Firstly this paper investigates the robustness of popular transform domain-based digital image watermarking schemes such as DCT, SVD, DWT, and their hybrid combinations against known image processing type attacks such as image blurring, compression, noise addition, rotation and cropping. Then, an enhanced hybrid scheme using DWT and SVD methods is proposed and its improved performance is demonstrated in terms of the quality of the extracted watermarks measured in terms of PSNR, SSIM and NCC values. This paper then proposes a novel adversarial attack based on a powerful Deep Convolutional Neural Network based Autoencoder(CAE) scheme. The CAE is specifically chosen to exploit its intrinsic capability to represent the image content (spatial and structural) through lower dimensional projections in the intermediate layers. The CAE is trained and tested on the entire image repository of the CIFAR10 data set. Once CAE is trained on a class of images and the parameters are frozen, it will serve as a system to produce a perceptually close image for any unseen input image belonging to the same class. The power of the proposed adversarial attack scheme is shown in terms of the quality of extracted watermarks against popular water mark embedding schemes. Finally the proposed enhanced hybrid strategy of DWT+SVD is shown to be robust against the new form of attack and outperforms all other techniques measured in terms of its high quality watermark extraction.

Enhancing Image Watermarking With Adaptive Embedding Parameter and PSNR Guarantee

Watermarking plays an important role in identifying the copyright of an image and related issues. The state-of-the-art watermark embedding schemes, spread spectrum and quantization, suffer from host signal interference (HSI) and scaling attacks, respectively. Both of them use a fixed embedding parameter, which is difficult to take both robustness and imperceptibility into account for all images. This paper solves the problems by proposing two novel blind watermarking schemes: a spread spectrum scheme with adaptive embedding strength (SSAES) and a differential quantization scheme with adaptive quantization threshold (DQAQT). Their adaptiveness comes from the proposed adaptive embedding strategy (AEP), which maximizes the embedding strength or quantization threshold by guaranteeing the peak signal-to-noise ratio (PSNR) of the host image after embedding the watermark, and strikes the balance between robustness and imperceptibility. SSAES is HSI free by factoring in the priori knowledge about HSI. In DQAQT, an effective quantization mode is proposed to resist scaling attacks by utilizing the difference between two selected DCT coefficients with high stability. Both SSAES and DQAQT can be easily applied to other watermarking frameworks. We introduce a notion called error threshold to theoretically analyze the performance of our proposed methods in details. The experimental results consistently demonstrate that SSAES and DQAQT outperform the state-of-the-art methods in terms of imperceptibility, robustness, computational cost, and adaptability.

A Novel fuzzy frame selection based watermarking scheme for MPEG-4 videos using Bi-directional extreme learning machine

With the advancement of Internet Technology, a lot of multimedia content is shared over the Internet resulting in several concerns over multimedia content like copyright protection, content authentication, and ownership. In this paper, we have developed a novel watermarking scheme for Advanced Video Coding (MPEG-4 AVC) videos using Bi-directional Extreme Learning Machine (B-ELM). Relevant frames to be watermarked are identified by implementing a newly developed fuzzy algorithm based on threshold operation. A binary watermark, encrypted by transposition cipher, is used to ensure enhanced security. The proposed watermarking scheme has been tested on five benchmark videos (Akiyo, Hall_Monitor, Mother_Daughter, Pamphlet, and Silent). High average Peak Signal to Noise Ratio (PSNR) values of the signed video sequences indicate good visual quality post-embedding. Common video interferences such as scaling, noising, cropping, filtering, frame dropping, frame averaging, and frame swapping are used to evaluate the robustness of the watermark embedding scheme. The high values of Normalized Correlation (NC(W,W′)) and Bit-Error-Rate (BER(W,W′)) between the original watermark (W) and the recovered watermark (W′) establish the good robustness of the proposed scheme. While the established algorithms such as Fuzzy Inference System (FIS), Back Propagation Network (BPN), Meta-heuristic techniques take time of the order of several seconds to process a frame, the proposed algorithm consumes only a few milliseconds. Thus, it is well suited for the real-time watermarking of compressed videos.

A Novel Compressed Encrypted and Encoded Watermark Embedding Scheme for Digital Images

In this research work a novel idea of compressed, encrypted and encoded watermark embedding scheme for digital images is proposed. Initially watermark is compressed using Huffman encoder. Compressed watermark is encrypted using combined binary key sequence {Ki} derived from sequence of logistic map and Lozi map. The compressed and encrypted binary watermark is encoded using (n,1) repetition code. This compressed, encrypted and encoded binary watermark is embedded in alternate locations of cover image pixels using of Least Significant Bit (LSB) and Second Least Significant Bit (SLSB). To study the watermarked image quality, parameters such as Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR) and Mean Square Error (MSE) are used. Also performance of the proposed system is compared with uncompressed, encrypted, encoded watermark embedding scheme. There is a significant improvement in MSE, SNR of watermarked image, when compressed watermark embedding scheme is compared to uncompressed watermark embedding scheme.

Anti-HEVC Recompression Video Watermarking Algorithm Based on the All Phase Biorthogonal Transform and SVD

ABSTRACTWith the rapid development of Internet of Things and multimedia technologies, people are paying more attention to the security of images and videos. To further improve the security of video content, a video watermarking algorithm based on the high efficiency video coding (HEVC) compression domain is proposed in this paper. The scheme embeds watermark information in the quantized coefficients, which can solve the cumulative error caused by watermark embedding. Moreover, the all phase biorthogonal transform (APBT), an improved transform, is used to compress the watermark data at the digital watermark preprocessing stage, optimize the watermark embedding scheme, and improve the embedding capacity of video watermarking. Due to the characteristics of HEVC video coding, most HEVC video watermarking schemes based on compression domain cannot resist recompression attack. To solve this problem, on the basis of APBT and singular value decomposition, an anti-HEVC recompression video watermarking algorithm is proposed and can effectively resist the HEVC recompression. Experimental results show that even when the quantization parameter is larger than 40, the extracted watermark still has good image quality. In addition, the algorithm also has a good performance in noise resistance.

A time-efficient optimization for robust image watermarking using machine learning

Watermarking is utilized for securing multimedia data exchange. The techniques used to embed a watermark typically require optimizing scheme parameters often through applying meta-heuristic optimization techniques. Although meta-heuristic techniques have been widely used due to their performance enhancing capability, they are not suitable for time sensitive applications due to their large time consumption. In this paper, a time-efficient optimization based on machine learning is proposed to find the best embedding strength parameter for robust image watermarking in terms of both the imperceptibility and robustness. First, a watermark embedding scheme is designed in the Discrete Cosine Transform domain, which provide a proper robustness against common watermarking attacks. Then, a training process is performed through selecting set of images upon which the watermarking is applied and optimized using the Artificial Bee Colony algorithm. Observation data is collected, which includes the optimum strength values along with the feature vectors that represent the training images. The features, of an image, are extracted by calculating the optimization fitness function at different values of the embedding strength. Finally, new set of images are chosen to be watermarked using the optimum embedding parameters that are predicted through the K-Nearest Neighborhood regression method. Experimental results show that the proposed method consumes considerably less time to evaluate the optimum solutions compared to using meta-heuristic optimization. Meanwhile, the error between the optimum and predicted optimum solutions has negligible impact on the optimization objectives.

A Watermarking Algorithm Based on DCT and JPEG Quantization Table

In this paper, we propose a scheme of watermark embedding and extracting based on DCT transform and JPEG quantization table. Firstly, the image is divided into non-overlapping 8 × 8 blocks, and each block is transformed by DCT. Then, a pair of points with the same quantization value is selected by the JPEG quantization table in order to embed one watermark bit, and the adjustment coefficients are adaptively selected by using the visual masking property of HVS. The experimental results presented in this paper showed that our proposed algorithm is robust to JPEG compression under different quality factors.

Robust Image Watermarking Based on Psychovisual Threshold

Because of the facility of accessing and sharing digital images through the internet, digital images are often copied, edited and reused. Digital image watermarking is an approach to protect and manage digital images as intellectual property. The embedding of a natural watermark based on the properties of the human eye can be utilized to effectively hide a watermark image. This paper proposes a watermark embedding scheme based on the psychovisual threshold and edge entropy. The sensitivity of minor changes in DCT coefficients against JPEG quantization tables was investigated. A watermark embedding scheme was designed that offers good resistance against JPEG image compression. The proposed scheme was tested under different types of attacks. The experimental results indicated that the proposed scheme can achieve high imperceptibility and robustness against attacks. The watermark recovery process is also robust against attacks.

Audio zero-watermark scheme based on discrete cosine transform-discrete wavelet transform-singular value decomposition

Traditional watermark embedding schemes inevitably modify the data in a host audio signal and lead to the degradation of the host signal. In this paper, a novel audio zero-watermarking algorithm based on discrete wavelet transform(DWT), discrete cosine transform(DCT), and singular value decomposition(SVD) is presented. The watermark is registered by performing SVD on the coefficients generated through DWT and DCT to avoid data modification and host signal degradation. Simulation results show that the proposed zero-watermarking algorithm is strongly robust to common signal processing methods such as requantization, MP3 compression, resampling, addition of white Gaussian noise, and low-pass filtering.

Coevolutionary design of a watermark embedding scheme and an extraction algorithm for detecting replicated two-dimensional barcodes

Two-dimensional barcodes (2D codes) are currently used to authenticate airplane boarding passes and online payments. However, little attention has been paid to the malicious replication or fabrication of 2D codes. In a previous study, the authors have proposed a semi-fragile watermark to distinguish an authentic 2D code from a replicated one and have attempted to design the watermarking scheme automatically using optimization. The optimization of a watermark extraction algorithm and watermarking scheme for stable watermark extractions from 2D codes displayed on various display types is the actual desire. However, it is difficult to formulate the two tasks, as a unified optimization problem and solve it with an optimization algorithm because the two problems have different structures and properties. Consequently, this study proposes a sparsely synchronized heterogeneous coevolutionary method for the simultaneous optimization of a watermark embedding scheme and extracting algorithm to detect the replication of 2D codes displayed on mobile phone screens. Experimental results have shown that the proposed method can design a watermark with desirable semi-fragileness that works well on different types of mobile phone displays.

Robust Histogram Shape-Based Method for Image Watermarking

Cropping and random bending are two common attacks in image watermarking. In this paper we propose a novel image-watermarking method to deal with these attacks, as well as other common attacks. In the embedding process, we first preprocess the host image by a Gaussian low-pass filter. Then, a secret key is used to randomly select a number of gray levels and the histogram of the filtered image with respect to these selected gray levels is constructed. After that, a histogram-shape-related index is introduced to choose the pixel groups with the highest number of pixels and a safe band is built between the chosen and nonchosen pixel groups. A watermark-embedding scheme is proposed to insert watermarks into the chosen pixel groups. The usage of the histogram-shape-related index and safe band results in good robustness. Moreover, a novel high-frequency component modification mechanism is also utilized in the embedding scheme to further improve robustness. At the decoding end, based on the available secret key, the watermarked pixel groups are identified and watermarks are extracted from them. The effectiveness of the proposed image-watermarking method is demonstrated by simulation examples.

Difference angle quantization index modulation scheme for image watermarking

In this paper, we propose a new angle quantization index modulation (AQIM) method, called the difference AQIM (DAQIM) method. The proposed method aims to improve the watermarking performance against gain attacks. Unlike the original AQIM method (Ourique et al., Angle QIM: a novel watermark embedding scheme robust against amplitude scaling distortions, in: Proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Acoustics, Speech, and Signal Processing, vol. 2, 2005, pp. 797–800), the DAQIM method quantizes the difference of the two angles instead of the angles themselves. The main advantage of the DAQIM method is to disperse the interference to the watermark signal from one angle to more angles. Thus, the watermark has a higher ability to resist attacks. We perform a theoretical analysis of the document-to-watermark ratio (DWR) based on our proposed method. We show that our proposed method can obtain a lower embedding distortion compared to the AQIM and the gradient direction watermarking (GDWM) (Nezhadarya et al., IEEE Trans. Inf. Forensics Secur., 6(4), 2011, 1200–1213), methods under the same robustness and payload conditions. The experimental results demonstrate that our proposed method outperforms common existing methods in terms of the robustness against various attacks such as the JPEG quantization noise, additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN), cropping effect and mean filtering.

Encoded Hybrid DWT based Watermarking Scheme based on Singular Matrix Decomposition

In the period of digital technology, digital information suffers from copyright and integrity violations. In case of any disputes like rights violation and content creator, digital watermark has a vital role to protect the property rights of the original owner of digital information. Numerous of watermarking techniques have been proposed recently but image quality of host image at receiving end is needed to be improved. We proposed Encoded Hybrid Digital Watermarking Scheme (EHDWS) to improve image quality which is based on Discrete Wavelet Transform (DWT), Singular Value Decomposition (SVD) and Bose ChaudhuriHocquenghem (BCH) code. DWT is used for decomposing the image into LL, HL, LH, HH sub-bands; SVD is used to decompose the image into orthogonal matrix (U), singular matrix (S), and inverse orthogonal matrix (V) and BCH code is used for error detection-correction, copyright protection and authentication. The proposed EHDWS has high degree of transparency, robustness, blindness. In EHDWS, watermark embedding scheme is used to encode the original watermark image by using BCH (7, 4) based algorithm for obtaining the encoded watermark image. Then embed this encoded watermark image into host image by using DWT-SVD based algorithm for obtaining the watermarked image. Watermark extracting scheme is used to obtain both extracted watermark image for authentication purpose and extracted host image from watermarked image to obtain original image. PSNR values are also calculated to know the quality of watermarked image. General Terms Image security, watermarking.

A Novel Medical Image Tamper Detection and Recovery Scheme using LSB Embedding and PWLCM

A novel medical image tamper detection and recovery scheme based on Least Significant Bit (LSB) embedding and Piecewise Linear Chaotic Map (PWLCM) is proposed in the paper. To meet the demand of medical usage, the proposed scheme not only improved the precision of detection compared with block-wise scheme of watermark embedding, but also guaranteed the security of the scheme by applying PWLCM. To evaluate the proposed scheme, a former scheme proposed by Xiao et al is used for comparison; the two scheme's visual quality, accuracy of detection, recovery quality and security are tested during the experiment. The experimental results suggest that the proposed scheme meets the demand of visual quality and security for using in medical image tamper detection and recovery.

On domain selection for additive, blind image watermarking

Abstract. Recently, a variety of digital watermarking schemes have been developed for copyright protection of digital images. In robust watermarking, which is used in copyright protection, transform-based algorithms are used to ensure resilience of the watermark to common signal processing attacks. The most frequently used watermarking algorithms for additive watermark embedding involve DCT, DFT, SVD and DWT domains. In this article we verify which domain is optimal for robust, the additive watermark embedding scheme. We demonstrate that in additive watermark embedding the embedding domain plays more important role than the embedding formula.

Perceptual differential energy watermarking for H.264/AVC

This paper presents a novel watermark embedding scheme for H.264/AVC video using a spatio-temporal just-noticeable difference (JND) model, which is based on 4?×?4 DCT blocks. Combined with the proposed JND model, a previous differential energy watermarking (DEW) algorithm is modified for better imperceptibility. Low-density parity-check (LDPC) and spread spectrum are used to enhance robustness of the watermark. The watermarked video has good robustness against common video attacks such as re-compression, additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN), salt-and-pepper noise, Gauss filtering, circular averaging filtering and frame averaging. The watermarked video also has good visual quality due to the introduced JND model.

A Novel Watermark Embedding and Detection Scheme Based on Zero- Knowledge Proof

A new watermark embedding and detection method in Microsoft Word 2007-2010 files which use Office Open XML (OOXML) format is proposed in this paper. Watermark information can be imperceptibly embedded into OOXML documents by replacing or adding the values of Revision Identifiers (RIs), which are specific attributes in the main document body of the OOXML document. In the detection process, a secure watermark detection scheme based on zero-knowledge proof is proposed without revealing any watermarking-related information to improve the security of watermarking detection. Experiments show that 4.43 bit is embedded into each word and 0.07 bit is embedded into each bit of the document on average, which is higher than contemporary linguistic watermarking approaches. The method can resist “Format”, “Impersonation”, “Save As”, “Copy” and other active attacks and all these changes will not be shown on the MS Office screen display. Therefore, the proposed method can apply to the field of security protection for OOXML format documents.

Rotation invariant watermark embedding based on scale-adapted characteristic regions

Rotation invariance is one of the most challenging issues in robust image watermarking. This paper presents two rotation invariant watermark embedding schemes in the non-subsampled contourlet transform (NSCT) domain based on the scale-adapted local regions. Watermark synchronization is achieved using the scale-space feature point based local characteristic regions. The first method embeds a binary watermark sequence by partitioning the local regions in a rotation invariant pattern. The second method embeds a binary watermark image in a content based manner, and the watermark signal is adaptive to the orientation of the image. Both methods achieve rotation invariant embedding by only using the rotation normalizing angle, thus no interpolation operation is performed. Extensive simulation results and comparisons show that the proposed schemes can efficiently resist both signal processing attacks and geometric attacks.