Adaptive Method of Data Hiding Using Edge Detection

Abstract

Data security is of utmost importance for an institution, organization and many government sectors to maintain the confidential information protected from different competitors. It will help to make sure that the security of user’s data is maintained. In today’s time most of the information is first received, then processed and finally is get saved within the computers and further transmitted across different networks, therefore, it is required to preserve the data in order to maintain confidentiality. The thesis work covers the introduction, need and type of cryptography in data communication. It also deals with the various techniques employed for the data security and the goals and applications of steganography. Difference between steganography and the process of image encryption is also discussed. Then, the various methods or techniques given by different scholars in the realm of cryptography and steganography are discussed in literature review. On the basis of literature survey, observations and the objectives are also drawn. After studying the various techniques of cryptography and keeping in mind the importance of steganography for transmission of secret data, the proposed work incorporates the use of encryption keys, LSB substitution method, edge detection and clustering process for data hiding. Data hiding efficiency among various image formats with different pixel sizes are found with the help of LSB algorithm. To ensure triple security of data process of encryption is combined with steganography. This is done by generating keys from data and then hiding back the encrypted data in the cover image. At last, the outcomes of the proposed data hiding algorithms which are based on detection of edges of the pixels of the image and clustering them in a group are compared. Thus, it has been concluded that the results of proposed algorithms show good value of PSNR as well as an acceptable quality of the stego image which makes it hard to discover any existence of embedded data in the cover image and hence, make it secure for transmission.