JOURNAL OF INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGIES, VOLUME 3, ISSUE 9, SEPTEMBER 2013

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A Novel Method for Information Hiding in Gradient Image

Dr. Salman Abd Kadum1 and Ali Abdul Azeez Mohammad Baker, M. Sc.2

Abstract
In this paper, we introduce a new method to hide information in Gradient image, the place where we hide message depend on the value of gray scale of the gradient image. The proposed system consist of two stages. First stage for message hiding where gradient image will be determined by using Robert method, while second stage for extract message from gradient image. Hide information in gradient image must never alter the visual properties of original image. In this paper, we also use a new technique in way of hiding information depend on the gradient image by determining the edge of objects in original image and hide the message in the gradient image in a specific range of gray scale values of the original image. Keywords: Steganography, gradient image, hide information, stego image, Robert mask.

1 2

Iraq, Najaf Technical Institute, Computer Department, Lecturer. Email: salman_abd_2002@yahoo.com Iraq, Education College, Kufa University.

1. Introduction
Steganography is the art of hiding information in ways that prevent the detection of hiding Information, in steganography secret Information is embedded in a cover in deterministic sequence, there exist two types of materials in steganography, which are message and carrier, Message is the secret Information that should be hidden and carrier is the material that takes the message in it [1].

There are many applications for steganography which are military, diplomatic, and personal applications. There are three principles to determine the effectiveness of steganography technique which are [2]: 1. The size of the message. 2. The 3. The difficulty difficulty of of detect alter the the message. message.

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Steganography

also

can

be

highest filter values first. It is less noticeable on an image because using the filter ensures that the hiding occurs in the parts of the image that are the least noticeable (Laplacian and Sobel filters (for edge detection) are the two most filters will be used). 4) The battle stage algorithm is the best of all which performs (Battleship Steganography). It

classified into four types according to cover file type such as follow [3]: 1. Text steganography. 2. Image steganography. 3. Audio steganography. 4. Video steganography. Image Steganography can be classified into three types according to the following [4]:
A. Least Significant Bits (LSBs): LSBs can be classified into four algorithms such as follow:

first filters the image then uses the highest filter values as a (ships) the (h %) of highest filter values which is designated as (ships). B. Masking and filtering techniques, take a different approach to hiding a message. effectively These similar methods to are paper

1) The blind hide algorithm is the simplest way to hide information in an image, it blindly hide information by starts at the top left corner of the image and works its way across the image (then down in scan lines) pixel by pixel. 2) The hide seek algorithm randomly hides the message into the image. It uses a password to generate a random seek, and then uses this seek to find the first position to hide in. It continues randomly generate positions until hiding the message. 3) The filter first algorithm filters the image and then hides in the

watermarks, creating markings in an image. This can be achieved for example by modifying the luminance of parts of the image. While masking does change the visible properties of an image, it can be done in such a way that the human eye will not notice the anomalies [5]. C. Transform Domain techniques utilize an algorithm such as the Discrete Cosine Transformation (DCT) or wavelet transformation to hide

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information in significant areas of the image.

2.1 Message Hiding Stage

This stage is divided into the following steps:1) Gradient image by using Robert algorithm. 2) Applying new proposed method to hide message in gradient image. 3) Applying inverse Robert algorithm to calculate pixels intensity of stego image.

2. Proposed System
In generl, the proposed system as illustrated in figure (1) consist of two stages, the first one is Message hiding stage in Gradient image and the second stage is message extracting stage from Gradient image that is generated by applying Robert method on stego image.

Cover (image)

Message (image)

2.1.1. Gradient Image by Using Robert Algorithm

Gradient image by using Robert algorithm Applying new proposed method to hide message in gradient image

The Robert Cross operator is a simple gradient operator based on a (2 x 2) gradient operator. This operator

Applying inverse Robert algorithm

Stego (gradient) image

provides the simplest approximation of the gradient magnitude such as follow:

Gf i , j = f i , j f i + 1, j + 1 + f i + 1, j f i , j + 1
Stego image Message extracting stage

(1)

The convolution mask for the

Gradient image by using Robert algorithm Apply inverse proposed method to extract message from gradient image

Roberts operator is shown below. Since the Robert kernel is only a (2 x 2) mask.

Message Image

1 -1

1 -1

Figure (1): Block diagram of the proposed system Figure (2): Robert mask.

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The result of applying Robert mask on an image is illustrated in figure (3). 00 Dont hide in this pixel 01 Hiding in one bit in this pixel 10 Hiding in two bits in this pixel 11 Hiding in three bits in this pixel

Figure (4): Calculating the number of bits that used a. Original Image b. Gradient Image in hiding information.

Figure (3): Applying Robert mask on gray level image.

2.1.2 Applying New Proposed Method to Hide Message in Gradient Image

The hiding of the message image in the pixels of gradient image depend on two conditions which are: 1. The intensity of each pixel in the gradient image where the information will be hidden in each pixel in gradient image that has intensity within a specific range to avoid the effect of approximation for pixels large than (255) and pixels small than (0), here we choose the range of gray scales of pixels that used in hiding information between (10) and (150). 2. The values of fourth and fifth bits of each pixel satisfy the first condition as illustrated below:

The result of applying these two conditions is illustrated in figure (5).

a. Original Image.

b. Gradient Stego Image.

Figure (5): Stego image (gradient).

2.1.3 Applying Inverse Robert Algorithm to Calculate Pixels Intensity of Stego Image
After hiding information in

gradient image, this image must be converted to stego gray scale image by applying inverse Robert mask to calculate the intensity of each pixel in modified (stego) image as illustrated in figure (6).

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I(0,0)

I(0,1)

I(0,2)

I(0,0)

I(0,1)

I(0,2)

I(0,0)

I(0,1)

I(0,2)

I(1,0)

IO1

IO2

I(1,0)

IG1

IG2

I(1,0)

IS1

IS2

The result of applying the above points is illustrated in figure (7).

I(2,0)

IO3

IO4

I(2,0)

IG3

IG4

I(2,0)

IS3

IS4

a. Original image

b. Gradient image

c. Stego image

Figure (6): Stego image calculation.

The illustration of the above points from figure (6) such as follow: 1. We dont hide in first row and first column. 2. I(0,0)I(0,2) and I(0,0)I(2,0) are equivalent in gradient, original, and stego images. 3. The gray scale of pixels of stego image will be calculated in order of IS1IS4. 4. IG1= I(0,0) + I(0,1) - I(1,0) IO1. IG2= I(0,1) + I(0,2) - IO1 - IO2. IG3= I(1,0) + IO1 - I(2,0) - IO3. IG4= IO1 + IO2 IO3- IO4. 5. IG1. IS2= I(0,1) + I(0,2) - IS1 - IG2. IS3=I(1,0) + IS1 - I(2,0) - IG3. IS4= IO1 + IS2 IS3- IG4. IS1= I(0,0) + I(0,1) - I(1,0) -

a. Stego gradient image.

b. Stego image

Figure (7): Covert gradient image into gray scale image.

2.2 Message Extracting Stage

This stage consist of the following steps:

2.2.1 Gradient Image by Using Robert Algorithm

By applying the mask illustrated in figure (2) to calculate gradient image.

2.2.2 Apply Inverse Proposed Method Image

The message bits will be extracted from gradient image by check the two points in section (2.1.2) to define the pixels that used in hiding information and the number of bits in each pixel that contains message bits.

to

Extract

Message from Gradient

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c. Message

d. Stego gradient image

e. Stego image

Figure (8): Result (1) of the proposed system.

2. The cover image is gray scale

3. Results
1. The cover image is gray scale image of size (552340) pixels, while message is gray scale image of size (7276) pixels, the peak signal to noise ratio is (39.8) which calculated by
(l 1)
2

image of size (476488) pixels, while message is gray scale image of size (8080) pixels, the peak signal to noise ratio is (35.6).

applying the following equation:

SNR
peak

= 10

log

10

2 1 n1 m1 [ g (r,c) I (r,c)] n m r =0 c =0

2)

Where, l is the number of gray levels in cover image. I(r,c) are the pixels before embedding process in cover image. g(r,c) are the pixels after embedding process in stego image. n,m are the width and height of cover image respectively.
c. Message d. Stego gradient image e. Stego image a. Original image b. Gradient image

Figure (10): Result (2) of the proposed system.

4. Conclusions
From the above discussion and results we conclude:
a. Original image b. Gradient image

1. The cover image must not contain big regions with same color because this leads to appear visual noise in stego image.

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2. We must not hide in white regions of cover image because white regions show noise in stego image that appear for any person as a guide that this image contains message. We cannot used this method to hide big message because of the large number of pixels with zero value or near this value and the large number of pixels with value of (255) or near this value which will not be used in hiding information.

[4]

Dr. M. Umamaheswari, Prof. S. Sivasubramanian, Different Algorithms Hiding", for IJCSNS and S. Pandiarajan, 2010, "Analysis of Steganographic Secured Data International

Journal of Computer Science and Network Security. [5] S.S., khaire, and dr. Sanjay, 2010, "Review: Steganography Bit Plane Complexity Segmentation (BPCS) Technique", International Journal of Engineering Science and Technology.

5. References
[1] E., Cole, and R. D. Krutz, 2003, " Hiding in Plain Sight: Steganography and the Art of Covert Communication", Wiley Publishing USA. [2] S. M., Thampi, 2004, "Information Hiding Techniques: A Tutorial Review", Department of Computer Science & Engineering LBS College of Engineering, Kasaragod Kerala, India. [3] S. K., Bandyopadhyay, D.,

Bhattacharyya, D., Ganguly, S. M., Poulami, 2008, "A Tutorial Review on Steganography" ,University of Calcutta.