Colored Image-In-Image Hiding

Mamoun Suleiman Al Rababaa

the last decade [35-48], and most of them were designed for
Abstract - Image hiding is a technique that embeds the two goals: to reduce the degradation of the visual quality of
important images into a cover image such that the the stego image, and to be able to completely recover the
important images are imperceptible and can be securely original important images. One of the most popular techniques
transmitted to the receiver. In this paper, we present a used to achieve these goals is the least-significant-bit (LSB)
steganographic method and software for embedding a substitution approach [36,38,47]. For example, Wang et al.
digital image (color image) in a true color image requires [47] introduced two well-known LSB substitution methods to
the use of uncompressed 24-bit windows format bitmap embed the bit stream of an important image into the LSBs of a
image cover image.
Typically, two types of image hiding schemes are
Keywords: Steganography; image hiding; Stego-image often used. The schemes of the first type hide secret messages
in the spatial domain of a host image. Several image-hiding
INTRODUCTION schemes based on the spatial domain, such as [5-9], have been
Data hiding technique is a generic term of designing proposed. The secret data are embedded into the pixels of the
a very wide set of applications, such as steganography [1]. host image directly. All of these schemes are not robust to
The term steganography is derived from the Greek language image compression such as JPEG [10]. But the size of data,
and means covert writing. It is the technique of encoding which can be hidden by replacing the rightmost fourleast
secret information in a communication channel in such a significant bits (LSB) per pixel in LSB substitution schemes,
manner that the very existence of the information is would be 131,072 bytes for an image of size 512× 512, for
concealed. example. The second type of image-hiding schemes embeds
The major goal of steganography is to enhance secret messages into a host image that has been transformed.
communication security by inserting secret message into the Generally, one of the transformation functions, such as the
digital image, modifying the nonessential pixels of the image discrete Fourier transform (DFT), the discrete cosine
[2,3]. The image after the embedding of the secret message, transform (DCT), or the discrete wavelet transform (DWT), is
so-called stego-image, is then sent to the receiver through a used to transform the pixel values in the spatial domain into
public channel. transformed coefficients in the frequency domain. Several
Computer-based image steganography [4] is one way of data steganographic methods based on DFT [11], DCT [12,13],
hiding which provides data security in digital images. It is and DWT [14,15] had been proposed. In general, the hiding
considered as a technique inspired from ancient capacity of these methods based on the frequency domain is
steganography. The aim is to embed and deliver secret limited. For example, the hiding capacity in the scheme based
messages in digital images without any suspiciousness. on DCT [13] is 6656 bytes. But schemes of this type ,provide
Many researchers have focused on steganographic better robustness than that of the first type.
schemes [16-30]; [21]; [22]; [23]. Until now, two major
techniques, the spatial domain manner [31]; [29] and the DIGITAL PICTURE WINDOWS FORMAT BITMAP
frequency domain manner [17] led in steganographic 1. Bitmap File:
development. - Bitmap: is a graphical object is used to create, manipulate,
Many steganographic techniques about embedding store images as files on a disk, the most common image
data in images have been proposed. A number of data formats that has the extension ".bmp".
embedding techniques are based on the method of replacing - Bitmap Structure: each bitmap file includes the following
the least-significantbits (LSBs) of the pixels of the cover headers that represent the bitmap attributes:
image [32] and a pseudo-random number generation - BITMAPFILEHEADER.
mechanism is often used to accomplish the security work [33]. - BITMAPINFO.
In [34] an LSB-like embedding technique is used in a - RGBQUAD (if any).
wavelet-based method by adding or subtracting one unit from - Pixel Bits.
the transform coefficients of the image. Some other - Bitmap Storage Structure:
steganographic methods based on modifying small details in The bitmap file arranges Headers in order way as following:
images are also published in the literature. - BITMAPFILEHEADER
Computer-based image steganography mainly considers the - BITMAPINFO
requirement that the steganographic result, the so-called - RGBQUAD (in 1, 4, 8 pits per pixel)
stego-image, be undetectable, as pointed out in [4]. Such - Pixel Bits
steganographic techniques may be used in various - BITMAPFILEHEADER:
applications. BITMAPFILEHEADER contains the following values:
Many image-hiding methods have been proposed in - Type: contains the file extension (very important for our
technique)
Mamoun Suleiman Al Rababaa – IT Faculty, CS Department,
- Size: contains the file of the whole bitmap file
AL al Bayt University, Jordan
[email protected]

CADSM’2009, 24-28 February, 2009, Polyana-Svalyava (Zakarpattya), UKRAINE

 - Reseved1: Reserved for the Windows use. ƒ Values of BITMAPINFOHEADER.
- Reseved2: Reserved for the Windows use. ƒ Bits that represent pixels colors.
- Offset: represents the distance (in bytes) between the 2. compute the required size for embedding the
beginning of the bitmap file to the beginning of Pixel secret image as following (in byte):
bits(very important for our technique) Required size = (3*width of secret *height of secret)
- BITMAPINFO: + (3*2) + (20*2)….....(1).
BITMAPINFO consists from two headers: Descriptions:
- BITMAPINFOHEADER a. (3*width of secret *height of secret) means:
- BITMAPINFOHEADER contains the following values: ƒ 3: each pixel needs 3 byte to represent
- Width: contains the width of the bitmap (in pixel) it.
- Height: contains the height of the bitmap (in pixel) ƒ Width*height: dimension of the secret
- BitCount: represents the type of the bitmap (1, 4, 8, 16, image.
24, 32 bits per pixel) b. (3*2) means:
- Other values (Compression, SizeImage, XPelsPerMeter, ƒ 3: 3 bytes for each one (width, height)
YPelsPerMeter, ClrUsed, ClrImportant) but these values for embedding them.
are not important in out technique. ƒ 2: represents number of values (width,
height).
- RGBQUAD: c. (20*2):
Represents the color table for the bitmap (if any). ƒ 20: 20 bytes for each one (password,
- Blue: the value of the blue color hidden message).
- Red: the value of the red color ƒ 2: represents number of values
- Green: the value of the green color (password, hidden message).
- Reserved: for the Windows use.
3. Compute the new offset value as following:
- Bitmap type: New offset value = old offset value + required size
1-bit per pixel: the bitmap is a monochrome (white and (from equation 1)……..(2).
black color), in this type the bitmap use the RGBQUAD 4. Compute the new bitmap file size as following:
(color table) and has two entries in this table (white and black New bitmap file size = new offset value (from
colors) (is not important in our technique). equation 2) + (cover width * cover height *
4-bit per pixel: the bitmap uses the RGBQUAD (color 3)……..3.
table) and has 16 colors in its color table. (Is not important in Note: 3 means each pixel needs 3 bytes to represent
our technique). it.
8-bit per pixel: the bitmap uses the RGBQUAD (color
table) and has 256 colors into it. (Is not important in our ƒ Stego image:
technique) 1. Copy the values of that cover structures.
16-bit per pixel: the bitmap does NOT use the RGBQUAD 2. update the following values:
(color table) and has RGB values for its pixels (RGB (5 bits, 5 ƒ BitmapFileHeader.FileSize = new bitmap
bits, 5 bits)). (Is not important in our technique). file size.
ƒ BitmapFileHeader.Offset = new offset
24-bit per pixel: the bitmap does NOT use the RGBQUAD value.
(color table) and has RGB values for its pixels (RGB (8 bits, 8 3. write the following values in sequenced order:
bits, 8 bits)). (is the Most important for our technique) ƒ Write all structures values of the cover
image after updating them to the stego image
THE PROPOSED ALGORITHM (BITMAPFILEHEADER,
BITMAPINFOHEADER).
1. Embedding algorithm: ƒ Write the width and the height values of the
ƒ Secret image: secret image to the stego image.
Secret image can be 1,4,8,16,24 bits per pixel. ƒ Write the password and the hidden message
1. Obtain values of pixels that represent the entire to the stego image.
secret image. ƒ Write the values of the secret image pixels
2. obtain width and height of the secret image to the stego image.
3. check that: ƒ Write the values of the cover image pixels
Width and height are more than 20px and lower than to the stego image.
5000px. Note:
Writing process: when you needing to write a
ƒ Cover image: value you must first convert this value into the
Note: cover image must be 24 bits per pixel. binary format then write it.
1. obtain the cover image data: 4. Save the stego image into an independent bitmap file.
ƒ Values of BITMAPFILEHEADER. The figure 3.1. Shows the embedding algorithm.

CADSM’2009, 24-28 February, 2009, Polyana-Svalyava (Zakarpattya), UKRAINE

Figure 1: embedding algorithm
2. Extracting algorithm:
1. obtain the following values from the stego image to
build the secret image:
ƒ Width, height, password, secret message,
bits that represent the secret image pixels.
2. Build the secret image according to these values.
Note: do not use never ever the stego image as a cover
image or as secret image.
The Figure 3.2. Shows extracting algorithm

Figure 2: extracting algorithm

CADSM’2009, 24-28 February, 2009, Polyana-Svalyava (Zakarpattya), UKRAINE

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 Extracting
Window for recover the secret image.

Features window

Embedding
Extracting window
This window for embedding the secret image.
Secret image

Secret image window

embedding window

Stego image

Stego image window

CADSM’2009, 24-28 February, 2009, Polyana-Svalyava (Zakarpattya), UKRAINE