Reversible data hiding: A contemporary survey of state-of-the-art, opportunities and challenges

During transmission of digital images, secret messages can be embedded using data hiding techniques. Such techniques can transfer private secrets without drawing the attention of eavesdroppers. To reduce the amount of transmitted data, image compression methods are widely applied. Hiding secret data in compressed images is a hot issue recently. In this paper, we apply the de-clustering concept and the indicator-free search-order coding (IFSOC) technique to hide information into vector quantization (VQ) compressed images. Experimental results show that the proposed two-layer reversible data hiding scheme for IFSOC-encoded VQ index table can hide a large amount of secret data among state-of-the-art methods with a relatively lower bit rate and high security.

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High-Capacity Reversible Data Hiding in Encrypted Images Based on Hierarchical Quad-Tree Coding and Multi-MSB Prediction

Electronics ◽

10.3390/electronics10060664 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 10 (6) ◽

pp. 664

Author(s):

Ya Liu ◽

Guangdong Feng ◽

Chuan Qin ◽

Haining Lu ◽

Chin-Chen Chang

Keyword(s):

Data Hiding ◽

Prediction Error ◽

Reversible Data Hiding ◽

Cloud Storage ◽

Additional Data ◽

State Of The Art ◽

Data Extraction ◽

High Capacity ◽

Quad Tree ◽

Encrypted Images

Nowadays, more and more researchers are interested in reversible data hiding in encrypted images (RDHEI), which can be applied in privacy protection and cloud storage. In this paper, a new RDHEI method on the basis of hierarchical quad-tree coding and multi-MSB (most significant bit) prediction is proposed. The content owner performs pixel prediction to obtain a prediction error image and explores the maximum embedding capacity of the prediction error image by hierarchical quad-tree coding before image encryption. According to the marked bits of vacated room capacity, the data hider can embed additional data into the room-vacated image without knowing the content of original image. Through the data hiding key and the encryption key, the legal receiver is able to conduct data extraction and image recovery separately. Experimental results show that the average embedding rates of the proposed method can separately reach 3.504 bpp (bits per pixel), 3.394 bpp, and 2.746 bpp on three well-known databases, BOSSBase, BOWS-2, and UCID, which are higher than some state-of-the-art methods.

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Fast and Effective Region-based Depth Map Upsampling with Application to Location Map-Free Reversible Data Hiding

Journal of Advances in Mathematics and Computer Science ◽

10.9734/jamcs/2020/v35i430268 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 24-45

Author(s):

Kuo-Liang Chung ◽

Yu-Ling Tseng ◽

Tzu-Hsien Chan ◽

Ching-Sheng Wang

Keyword(s):

Data Hiding ◽

Reversible Data Hiding ◽

State Of The Art ◽

Depth Map ◽

Ground Truth ◽

The State ◽

Embedding Capacity ◽

Art Methods ◽

Location Map ◽

Depth Map Upsampling

In this paper, we rst propose a fast and eective region-based depth map upsampling method, and then propose a joint upsampling and location map-free reversible data hiding method, simpled called the JUR method. In the proposed upsampling method, all the missing depth pixels are partitioned into three disjoint regions: the homogeneous, semi-homogeneous, and non- homogeneous regions. Then, we propose the depth copying, mean value, and bicubic interpolation approaches to reconstruct the three kinds of missing depth pixels quickly, respectively. In the proposed JUR method, without any location map overhead, using the neighboring ground truth depth pixels of each missing depth pixel, achieving substantial quality, and embedding capacity merits. The comprehensive experiments have been carried out to not only justify the execution-time and quality merits of the upsampled depth maps by our upsampling method relative to the state-of-the-art methods, but also justify the embedding capacity and quality merits of our JUR method when compared with the state-of-the-art methods.

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Intra-Block Correlation Based Reversible Data Hiding in Encrypted Images Using Parametric Binary Tree Labeling

Symmetry ◽

10.3390/sym13061072 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 13 (6) ◽

pp. 1072

Author(s):

Arun Kumar Rai ◽

Neeraj Kumar ◽

Rajeev Kumar ◽

Hari Om ◽

Satish Chand ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Data Hiding ◽

Binary Tree ◽

Reversible Data Hiding ◽

State Of The Art ◽

High Capacity ◽

Block Based ◽

Pixel Correlation ◽

Encrypted Images ◽

Labeling Scheme ◽

Embedding Rate

In this paper, a high capacity reversible data hiding technique using a parametric binary tree labeling scheme is proposed. The proposed parametric binary tree labeling scheme is used to label a plaintext image’s pixels as two different categories, regular pixels and irregular pixels, through a symmetric or asymmetric process. Regular pixels are only utilized for secret payload embedding whereas irregular pixels are not utilized. The proposed technique efficiently exploits intra-block correlation, based on the prediction mean of the block by symmetry or asymmetry. Further, the proposed method utilizes blocks that are selected for their pixel correlation rather than exploiting all the blocks for secret payload embedding. In addition, the proposed scheme enhances the encryption performance by employing standard encryption techniques, unlike other block based reversible data hiding in encrypted images. Experimental results show that the proposed technique maximizes the embedding rate in comparison to state-of-the-art reversible data hiding in encrypted images, while preserving privacy of the original contents.

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Separable Reversible Data Hiding in Encrypted Image Based on Two-Dimensional Permutation and Exploiting Modification Direction

Mathematics ◽

10.3390/math7100976 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 7 (10) ◽

pp. 976

Author(s):

Chunqiang Yu ◽

Chenmei Ye ◽

Xianquan Zhang ◽

Zhenjun Tang ◽

Shanhua Zhan

Keyword(s):

Data Hiding ◽

Reversible Data Hiding ◽

State Of The Art ◽

Data Extraction ◽

Visual Quality ◽

Two Dimensional ◽

Original Image ◽

Encrypted Image ◽

Peak Points ◽

Exploiting Modification Direction

In this paper, we propose a separable reversible data hiding method in encrypted image (RDHEI) based on two-dimensional permutation and exploiting modification direction (EMD). The content owner uses two-dimensional permutation to encrypt original image through encryption key, which provides confidentiality for the original image. Then the data hider divides the encrypted image into a series of non-overlapping blocks and constructs histogram of adjacent encrypted pixel errors. Secret bits are embedded into a series of peak points of the histogram through EMD. Direct decryption, data extraction and image recovery can be performed separately by the receiver according to the availability of encryption key and data-hiding key. Different from some state-of-the-art RDHEI methods, visual quality of the directly decrypted image can be further improved by the receiver holding the encryption key. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed method outperforms some state-of-the-art methods in embedding capacity and visual quality.

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Obtuse Angle Prediction and Factor Evaluation for Image Reversible Data Hiding

Mathematical Problems in Engineering ◽

10.1155/2017/8069792 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 2017 ◽

pp. 1-17

Author(s):

Hongyin Xiang ◽

Jinsha Yuan ◽

Sizu Hou

Keyword(s):

Data Hiding ◽

Reversible Data Hiding ◽

State Of The Art ◽

Obtuse Angle ◽

Context Vector ◽

Pixel Location ◽

Factor Evaluation ◽

Pixel Value ◽

Vector Dimension ◽

Prediction Strategy

A pixel-based pixel-value-ordering (PPVO) has been used for reversible data hiding to generate large embedding capacity and high-fidelity marked images. The original PPVO invented an effective prediction strategy in pixel-by-pixel manner. This paper extends PPVO and proposes an obtuse angle prediction (OAP) scheme, in which each pixel is predicted by context pixels with better distribution. Moreover, for evaluating prediction power, a mathematical model is constructed and three factors, including the context vector dimension, the maximum prediction angle, and the current pixel location, are analyzed in detail. Experimental results declare that the proposed OAP approach can achieve higher PSNR values than PPVO and some other state-of-the-art methods, especially in the moderate and large payload sizes.

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Reversible Data Hiding Exploiting Coefficients Histogram in Wavelet Transform Domain

Applied Mechanics and Materials ◽

10.4028/www.scientific.net/amm.284-287.3164 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 284-287 ◽

pp. 3164-3167

Author(s):

Te Lung Yin ◽

Xu Ren Luo

Keyword(s):

Wavelet Transform ◽

Data Hiding ◽

Reversible Data Hiding ◽

State Of The Art ◽

Wavelet Coefficient ◽

High Capacity ◽

Experimental Results ◽

Transform Domain ◽

Wavelet Coefficients ◽

Visual Distortion

Reversible data hiding has drawn lots of interest in the last a few years. With reversibility, original media can be recovered without any distortion from the marked media after the embedded data has been extracted. In this paper, we present a new scheme which utilizes the wavelet transform and better exploited large variance of wavelet coefficient differences to achieve high capacity and imperceptibility. With the particularity of minor changes in the wavelet coefficients after embedding data, low visual distortion can therefore be obtained in the marked image. Furthermore, an extraordinary attribute of our scheme is that the use of embedding level differs greatly from previous schemes. Experimental results showed that the performance our scheme outperforms the state-of-the-art reversible data hiding schemes.

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