International Journal of Engineering Trends and Technology (IJETT) - Volume4Issue5- May 2013
Steganography
K.Yugala
CSE Department,KLUniversity
Vaddeswaram,Guntur Dt
K.Venkata Rao
Professor,CSE,KLUniversity
C. Water Marking: Through the use of advanced computer
Abstract-Steganography is the art of hiding
information and an effort to conceal the existence of
the embedded information. It serves as a better way of
securing message than cryptography which only
conceals the content of the message not the existence of
the message. Original message is being hidden within a
carrier such that the changes so occurred in the
carrier are not observable. In this paper we will
discuss how digital images can be used as a carrier to
hide messages. This paper also analyses the
performance of some of the steganography tools.
Steganography is a useful tool that allows covert
transmission of information over an over the
communications channel.
Combining secret image
with the carrier image gives the hidden image. The
hidden image is difficult to detect without retrieval.
INTRODUCTION
As commercially available computational resources grow
in power, so does their ability to “break” encryption schemes. To
provide new ways to ensure security of internet communications,
researchers are developing alternative techniques.
To human eyes, data usually contains known forms like
images,e-mail,sounds and text. Most Internet data naturally
includes gratuitous headers, too.
Take a moment to read the previous paragraph.If you
think it is a vague and awkward,then I have succeeded in using a
very simple form of steganography.By taking the first letter of the
every word of the previous paragraph we will discover a message
that says :The duck flies at mid-night.
D. Finger Printing: Hiding serial numbers or a set of
characteristics that distinguishes an
object
from a similar object is known as fingerprinting.
E. Together, these two are intended to fight piracy. The
latter is used to detect copyright violators and the
former is used to prosecute them.
F. Perhaps when you were a child, you used lemon juice to
write text on paper, then let the paper dry. Your writing
would miraculously reappear on the apparently blank sheet
of paper when you heated it. Or perhaps when you were
older, and were introduced to money, you noticed the
image, or watermark, that would appear on bank notes
when they were held up to the light. Both these types of
situations are examples of steganography, the art of secret
writing.
G. Although related to cryptography, they are not the
same. Steganography's intent is to hide the existence
of the message, while cryptography scrambles a
message so that it cannot be understood.
H. More precisely, as Kuhn puts it:
I. ``the goal of steganography is to hide messages inside
other harmless messages in a way that does not allow
any enemy to even detect that there is a second secret
message present.''
DEFINITIONS:
A. Steganography: Steganography is a means of storing
B.
software, authors of images, music and software can
place a hidden ``trademark'' in their product, allowing
them to keep a check on piracy. This is commonly
known as watermarking.
information in such a way that it hides private
information and even the existence of the information
with in the other medium.
INTRODUCTION TO TERMS USED
Now, it is gaining new popularity with the current industry
demands for digital watermarking and fingerprinting of audio
and video.
The adjectives cover, embedded and stego were defined at
the Information Hiding Workshop held in Cambridge,
England. The term ``cover'' is used to describe the original,
innocent message, data, audio, still, video and so on. When
referring to audio signal steganography, the cover signal is
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In the field of steganography, some terminology has
developed.
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sometimes called the ``host'' signal. The information to be
hidden in the cover data is known as the ``embedded'' data.
The ``stego'' data is the data containing both the cover
signal and the ``embedded'' information. Logically, the
processing of putting the hidden, or embedded data, into
the cover data, is sometimes known as embedding.
Occasionally, especially when referring to image
steganography, the cover image is known as the container.
designing a new steganographic system. Later, Les Filigranes,
written by Charle Briquet in 1907, was a historical
dictionary of watermarks.
STEGANOGRAPHY UNDER VARIOUS MEDIA
In the following three sections we will try to show
how steganography can and is being used through the media of
text, images, and audio.
HISTORY
Our earliest records of steganography were recorded
by the Greek historian Herodotus and date back to Greek
times. When the Greek tyrant Histiaeus was held as a prisoner
by king Darius in Susa during the 5th century BCE, he had to
send a secret message to his son-in-law Aristagoras in Miletus.
Histiaeus shaved the head of a slave and tattooed a message on
his scalp. When the slave's hair had grown long enough he was
dispatched to Miletus. Invisible inks have always been a
popular method of steganography. Ancient Romans used to
write between lines using invisible inks based on readilyavailable substances such as fruit juices, urine and milk. When
heated, the invisible inks would darken, and become legible.
Invisible inks were used as recently as World War II.
An early researcher in steganography and cryptography
was Johannes Trithemius (1462-1526), a German monk. His first
work on steganography, Steganographia, described systems of
magic and prophecy, but also contained a complex system of
cryptography. It was only published posthumously, as Trithemius
had feared the reaction of the authorities if it was published. The
earliest actual book on steganography was a four hundred page
work written by Gaspari Schotti in 1665 and called
Steganographica. But it was during the twentieth century that
steganography truly flowered. For example, the following message
was sent by a German spy during WWII:
Apparently neutral's protest is thoroughly
discounted and ignored. Isman hard hit. Blockade issue
affects pretext for embargo on by-products, ejecting suets
and vegetable oils. Decoding this message by taking the
second letter in each word reveals the following secret
message:
Pershing sails from NY June 1.
As an interesting example of steganography of this era,
many scholars suspect the authorship of the Shakespearean
plays can be attributed to Francis Bacon, the noted Elizabethan
statesman and writer. They back this up with the discovery of
several hidden texts - steganographies - in the plays, which
contain the name of Bacon. These ciphers, together with some
interesting background information on Shakespeare and Bacon,
makes for a convincing argument. Penn Leary, in his book
``The Second Cryptographic Shakespeare'' discusses this in
detail. Further development in the field occurred in 1883, with
the publication of Auguste Kerckhoffs' Cryptographie militaire.
Although this work was mostly about cryptography, it
describes some principles that are worth keeping in mind when
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1 Embedding Data:
The goal of steganography is to conceal data. There
are a few features and restrictions to successfully hide data.
“The goal is for the data to remain “hidden.” . The word
“hidden” has two meanings here, (1) the data can be “hidden”
and not visible to the human eye (2) the data can be visible and
still not visible to the human eye. If the focus is deterred from
the data, the data will not be seen, which means that it is
“hidden”. The following guidelines represent a few features
and restrictions when embedding data.
Often, although it is not necessary, the hidden messages
will be encrypted. This meets a requirement posed by the
``Kerckhoff principle'' in cryptography. This principle
states that the security of the system has to be based on the
assumption that the enemy has full knowledge of the
design and implementation details of the steganographic
system. The only missing information for the enemy is a
short, easily exchangeable random number sequence, the
secret key. Without this secret key, the enemy should not
have the chance to even suspect that on an observed
communication channel, hidden communication is taking
place. Most of the software that we will discuss later meets
this principle. When embedding data, Bender et al.
reminds us that it is important to remember the following
restrictions and features:





The cover data should not be significantly degraded
by the embedded data, and the embedded data should
be as imperceptible as possible. (This does not mean
the embedded data needs to be invisible; it is possible
for the data to be hidden while it remains in plain
sight.)
The embedded data should be directly encoded into
the media, rather than into a header or wrapper, to
maintain data consistency across formats.
The embedded data should be as immune as possible
to modifications from intelligent attacks or anticipated
manipulations such as filtering and resampling.
Some distortion or degradation of the embedded data
can be expected when the cover data is modified. To
minimize this, error correcting codes should be used.
The embedded data should be self-clocking or
arbitrarily re-entrant. This ensures that the embedded
data can still be extracted when only portions of the
cover data is available. For example, if only a part of
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image is available, the embedded data should still be
recoverable.
COVER
MEDIA
Secret
Message
(To be
StegoMedia
(Carrier
With Hidden
Steganogra
phy
Steganographic Process:
In the above figure cover media is the carrier medium
- such as text ,image ,audio, video and even the network packet.
The secret message is the private message that is to be hidden in
the cover media.
Image as carrier:
Images are a good medium for hiding the data. The
more detailed an image ,the fewer constraints there are on how
much data it can hide before it becomes suspect. Digital images are
a preferred media for hiding information due to their high capacity
and low impact on visibility.
If you want to transfer an image file and a text file, you
have to store the text inside the image file by using text-on-image
algorithm.
TEXT-ON-IMAGE ALGORITHM
Inputs: Image file and the text file
Output: Text embedded image
Procedure:
Step 1: Extract all the pixels in the given image and store it in the
array called Pixel-Array
Step 2: Extract all the characters in the given text file and store it in
the array called Character-Array
Step 3: Repeat for every pixel in the Pixel-Array
a) If the index of the Pixel-Array is lessthan the size of the
text file:
(i) Store the current character value of the
Character-Array in the Alpha field of the
current pixel in the Pixel-Array.
b) Else
(i) Store the value 0 in the alpha field of the
current pixel in the Pixel-Array
c) Increment the index of both the arrays(Character-Array
and Pixel-Array)
The above algorithm works only if the size of the text file
is less than the size of the image file. This algorithm changes only
the Alpha field in every pixel. The change is not visible by the
human eyes. Thus the image and the text files can be transferred in
the same time it takes to transfer the image file. On the receiving
side reverse of the algorithm is used to get the actual message.
PIXEL REPRESENTATION IN RGB
The matrix of pixels represents every image. According to
the basic RGB color model, every pixel is represented by the four
bytes namely
alpha, red ,green, blue. Their significance is as follows:
TEXT_ON_I
IMAGE
FILE
Alpha: Gives the degree of transparency for a pixel
Red: Gives the intensity of red color in that pixel
Green: Gives the intensity of green color in that pixel
Blue: Gives the intensity of blue color in that pixel
IMAGE
Therefore we can store one byte of information in the alpha field of
FILE1
every pixel ,because it doesn't effect color value of the pixel. This
way we can store the secret messages inside the image and send
this message to the destination. At the receiving end, we extract the
characters from the pixels and reconstruct the message from the
image.
Bandwidth Reduced File Transfer:
Let’s say the image file takes six minutes to transfer and
the text file takes three minutes to transfer from a machine A to B.
If you transfer the image and text file separately, the transfer will
take a total of nine minutes. With the reduced file transfer
technique, you can transfer both the text and image file within six
minutes.
Simultaneous image and text file transfer:
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MAGE
TEXT
EMBEDDE
D
TEXT
FILE
IMAGE_ON_I
MAGE
IMAGE
EMBEDDED
IMAGE
IMAGE
Simultaneous transfer of two image files:
If you want to transfer two image files, you have
to store the second image inside the first image file by using
image-on-image algorithm.
IMAGE-ON-IMAGE ALGORITHM
Inputs: Two image files
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Output: Image embedded image
procedure:
Step 1: Extract all the pixels in the given first image and store it in
the array called Pixel-Array1
Step 2: Extract all the pixels in the given second image and store it
in the
array called Pixel-Array
Step 3: Repeat for every pixel in the Pixel-Array1
1) If the index of Pixel-Array2 is less than the size of
the first image:
(i) Store the Red value of the current pixel in the pixel-Array2 to
the Alpha field of the current pixel in the Pixel-Array1
(ii) Increment the index value of the pixelArray-1
(iii)Store the Green value of the current pixel in the pixel-Array2 to
the Alpha field of the current pixel in the Pixel-Array1
(iv)Increment the index value of the pixelArray-1
(v)Store the Blue value of the current pixel in the pixel-Array2 to
the Alpha field of the current pixel in the Pixel-Array1
(vi)Increment the index value of the pixel- Array1
2) Else
(i) Store the value 0 to the Alpha field of the current pixel in the
Pixel-Array1
(ii)Increment the index value of the Pixel-Array1
(iii) Store the value 0 to the Alpha field of the current pixel in the
Pixel-Arraay-1
(iv)Increment the index value of the Pixel- Array1
(v) Store the value 0 to the Alpha field of the current pixel in the
Pixel-Array1
3) Increment the index value of the Pixel-Array2
The above algorithm works only if the size of the second
image file is one-third the size of the first image file. Because
you need three pixels of the first image to store the red, green,
blue values of a single pixel of the second image. On the
receiving side reverse of the algorithm is used to get the actual
message.
FUTURE ENHANCEMENTS
The bandwidth reduced file transfer technique has been
worked out in a LAN network using Java as implementing
language. This technique is particularly efficient and useful when
implemented on the Internet. And it can be used as an alternative to
the compression and decompression techniques in file transfer.
A CLASS OF STEGANOGRAPHIC PROTOCOLS
INTRODUCTION
Steganography is the art of hiding one message in another.
In this note, the host message is defined as a block of random data
- available to both sender and receiver. This, arguably, also
classifies the following schemes as varieties of stream cipher.
One use of this class could be to foil traffic analysis - the sender
can automatically queue messages, randomise the apparent
message rate and adjust the actual message rate accordingly. This
assumes sufficient bandwidth to cope with messaging requirements.
These comments apply to a group of protocols that
embed a message, one bit at a time, in a block of
(pseudo)random data. Implicit in these schemes is that both the
sender and receiver have copies of, or can synthesize, the
random data stream.
The message should be compressed and then ciphered
using standard techniques before the steganography is applied.
The more random the message appears, the more difficult the
attack will be. The requirement for message randomness may
be fulfilled by a relatively weak cipher in this context.
It is also assumed that the ratio of message to random data
is quite low ie less than 1:10.
GENERAL
The more protocol information embedded in a
stegotext the more danger there is of a compromise of the
message. The sender must be able to vary certain parameters of
the stegotext such as the message to random data ratio. This
imposes limits on any implied protocols. Factors effecting
these parameters could be message randomness, the
randomness of the 'random data', storage capacity, transmission
channel capacity, the time taken for transmission and
maintaining constant or confusing levels of traffic. If the
random data source is not random ie it is a distinct message
such as a picture or a sound file, then the requirement would be
to only modify certain bits in the file. An implicit protocol may
use (say) the least significant bit of a 24-bit graphics file. This
bit is probably a 'noise' bit anyway, but the protocol would
have to use every least significant bit. The protocols described
here allow the sender to randomly determine which bits are
used. Where there is a high random data to message ratio, the
random data is totally exposed to analysis. Thus
cryptographically very strong pseudorandom generators must
be used. The apparent randomness of the stegotext is probably
the most important overall factor.
PROTOCOLS
In the following descriptions, it is assumed that there
is an independent process that randomly moves a pointer along
the random data to select the next protocol event ie where the
next message bit is to be insinuated. If the selected point is not
suitable, then the pointer will be moved along incrementally
until conditions are suitable. The algorithm for moving the
pointer is constrained by the needs of the message to random
data ratio.The following examples attempt to explore some
possibilities and are presented in an evolutionary order ie that
of increasing complexity.
Bit Inversion :
SCOPE
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In this technique, a bit of particular value in the random data is
chosen and then inverted. Ie a message bit of '1' is implied if a
'0' is turned into a '1' and vice versa:
1:
R1, R2, 0, R4, R5 -> R1, R2, 1, R4, R5
0:
R1, R2, 1, R4, R5 -> R1, R2, 0, R4, R5
^
^
The message is easily extracted by comparing the random data
with the stegotext and noting every bit that is different plus its
value.
Bit Insertion :
Here, the bit at the insertion point is chosen to be of opposite value
to the message bit. The message bit is inserted just prior to the
selected bit:
R1, R2, R3, T1, T2, T3, R7, R8 ->
^ ^ ^ ^ R1, R2, ~R3, T1, T2, T3, R7, R8
^ ^ ^ ^
0: T1, T2, T3 = 000, 100, 010 or 001
1: T1, T2, T3 = 110, 101, 011 or 111
LOOK-UP TABLE
In similar vein to the threshold scheme, the parity of,
or any other n:1 bit function of a number of bits in the random
data stream could determine the message bit. However, as a
generalisation, a table look-up system could be used to
determine the message bit from a group of random data bits. If
n bits were used, then there would be a 2n by one bit look-up
table.
Dynamic Look-Up Table:
1:
0:
R1, R2, 0, R4, R5 -> R1, R2, 1, 0, R4, R5
R1, R2, 1, R4, R5 -> R1, R2, 0, 1, R4, R5
^
^ ^
Again, the message is easily extracted by comparing the
random data with the stegotext and noting where a bit is different
plus its value. The stegotext is then shifted by one bit to regain
alignment and the comparison is continued to find the next bit.
Leading on from 4.6, the look-up table could be
dynamically modified each time it was used. This would
probably be accomplished by swapping the entry that had just
been used with one chosen at random. It should be noted that
although bit inversion has been used to indicate the protocol
event, bit insertion and bit deletion schemes can be used just as
well.
Bit Deletion :
Implied Dynamic Look-Up Table:
The bits at the deletion point are chosen to be either a '01' or a '10'
pair, depending on the value of the message bit. In the case of a '1',
a '10' pair is chosen and the '1' of the pair is deleted:
1:
R1, R2, 1, 0, R5, R6 -> R1, R2, 0, R5, R6
0:
R1, R2, 0, 1, R5, R6 -> R1, R2, 1, R5, R6
^ ^
^
The message is easily extracted by comparing the random
data with the stegotext and noting where a bit is different plus its
value. The stegotext is then shifted by one bit to regain alignment
and the comparison is continued to find the next bit.
Flag Bit :
Here, the selected bit is inverted, but with the proviso that the
following bit coincides with the message bit:
1:
R1, R2, R3, 1, R5 -> R1, R2, ~R3, 1, R5
0:
R1, R2, R3, 0, R5 -> R1, R2, ~R3, 0, R5
^ ^
^ ^
Where ~ denotes inversion. To extract the message, compare the
random data with the stegotext and note the bit after each
comparison failure.
As the receiver already has the table index, there is no
reason why it should be transmitted, thus reducing bandwidth.
In this case, the table is positioned after the inversion flag and,
during transmissi -on, the table bits are omitted:
R1, R2, R3, T1, T2, T3, R7, R8 -> R1, R2, ~R3, R7, R8
^ ^ ^ ^
^
where T1, T2 and T3 are used for the address of an eight entry
dynamic look-up table that determines the message bit. For
completeness, it should be noted that there could also be an
Implied Look-Up Table scheme.
PROTOCOL CONTROL CHANNEL
In these schemes there is a need for data other than
message data to be transmitted. Examples might be messages
to indicate that the size of look-up table or the encoding
scheme is about to change. This can be accomplished by
setting certain parameters outside of their normal bounds. If,
say, there is a minimum limit set for the number of random bits
that are transmitted between protocol events, then breaking this
rule can be used as a message in itself or indicate that a larger
message is immanent.
Threshold Bits
Indirect Dynamic Look-up Table :
This method is similar to the flag method. However, instead of
taking the value of just one bit after the inversion flag, a threshold
decision is made on the subsequent n random data bits where n is
an odd number. Thus if n = 3, the message bit is '0' if only one or
none of the 3 bits is a '1'. Two or three random bits set to '1' would
indicate a message bit of value '1':
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So far in these schemes, either all or part of the random
data has been transmitted. In the case where a
pseudorandom generator is used, if sufficient data is
captured, an evesdropper may be able to guess the
structure and state of the generator. This can be made
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much more difficult by sending a series of numbers that
represent the distances between protocol events. This
approach and the Implied Dynamic Look-up Table scheme
reduce the amount of data transmitted and thus the
capability of these schemes to defeat traffic analysis. In
fact, it may be better to improve their efficiency and define
them as a class of lossy cipher combiners.
Event Span :
I am indebted to Bruce Christianson for this suggestion.
The span or distance between protocol events is used as an index
into a dynamic look-up table:
R1, R2, R3, R4, R5, R6 -> R1, R2, ~R3, R4, ~R5, R6
^
^
^
^
Here the indicated events are two bits apart and the number two
can then be used with a dynamic look-up table to produce the next
message bit
.
DETECTING STEGANOGRAPHY
Attempts to detect the presence of steganographic
messages are referred to as “attacks”. Usually attacks are either
passive or active. In a passive attack, theinterceptor is able to
intercept the data. In an active attack the interceptor is ableto
manipulate the data. Whether the attack is passive or active the
steganographer must use caution when choosing certain data hiding
techniquesso that unusual patterns do not stand out to expose the
possibility of hidden information.Shifts in word and line spacing
may be difficult to detect hidden information in text. Opening the
text with a word processor can easily reveal appended spaces and
"invisible" characters.Images can appear to have distortions. The
steganographer needs to ensure that the “picture taken” is the
“picture seen”. The original image and the stego-image should not
have detectable variations in color composition, luminance, and
pixel relationships. Steganographers need to avoid well-known
images for this reason. A checksum can be embedded into a stegoimage to be used as a tampering detector. The drawback here is
that there is no way to tell how much the information has been
tampered with. Audio can be detected with “visible noise”. Echoes
and shadow signals reduce the chance of audible noise but can be
detected with little processing.
White Noise Storm and S-Tools allow a paranoid sender to
embed messages in digitized information, typically audio,
video or still image files, that are sent to a recipient.
It has been noted that the Abul Nidal organization and
Bin Laden’s al Qa’ida organization were using computerized
Internet files by methods of e-mail, steganography, and encryption to communicate to their operations. It has been
reported that the alleged hijackers in the September 11th
attacks had Internet email accounts and were using them to
communicate with each other. Mohammed Atta, one of the
alleged hijackers was repeatedly seen in a Florida library
downloading pictures of children and Middle Eastern scenes
which authorities suspect he used as secret method of
communication.
ADVANTAGES
Why use steganography? The advantage of using
steganography is to conceal information The transmission of
messages is transparent to any given viewer. Messages can be
concealed in different formats that are undetectable and
unreadable to the human eye. Steganographic technologies are
very important in Internet privacy today. With the use of
steganography and encryption, corporations, governments, and
law enforcement agencies can communicate secretly.
Encryption protects data and can be detected; the only thing
missing is the secret key for decryption. Steganography is
harder to detect under traditional traffic pattern analysis .
Steganography enhances the privacy of personal
communication. Since encryption can be detected and some
governments prohibit the use of encryption, steganography can
be used to supplement encryption . Additional layers of
security are a benefit to secrecy. If a steganogrphic message is
detected, there still is the need for the encryption key. A hidden
message need not be encrypted to qualify as steganography.
The method of encrypting a message and then using
steganography is most widely used by steganographers.
DISADVANTAGES
BIN LADEN: STEGANOGRAPHY MASTER?
If there's one thing the FBI hates more than Osama bin
Laden, it's when Osama bin Laden starts using the Internet. So
it should be no surprise that the feds are getting unusually
jittery about what they claim is evidence that bin Laden and his
terrorist allies are using message-scrambling techniques to
evade law enforcement.USA Today reported on Tuesday that
bin Laden and others "are hiding maps and photographs of
terrorist targets and posting instructions for terrorist activities
on sports chat rooms, pornographic bulletin boards and other
websites, U.S. and foreign officials say." Modern
steganographers have far-more-powerful tools. Software like
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However, there are disadvantages to mention. One of
the biggest disadvantages is that quite frequently the size of a
stagnated image is usually larger that the original image. There
can be color changes, especially evident if well-know images
are chosen as the steganographic cover. Images can be
degraded when trying to analyze them. Another issue to
mention, text messages are limited in size for the hiding of data.
They need redundant data to replace a secret message.
Changing the type of the format or replacing the readable text
can alter text messages. Through the use of new technology,
some Internet firewalls can detect steganographic messages. As
this technology evolves detecting steganographic messages can
be a drawback because an important message may be deleted
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or quarantined and this message may be the one that will save a
country.
[3] Zollner, Federrath, Klimant, Pfitzmann, Piotraschke, Westfeld, Wicke,
Wolf,“Modelling the security of steganographic systems” Paper presented
at the 2ndWorkshop on Information Hiding.
[4] Cole, Eric. “Book Excerpt: Hiding in Plain Sight” Published on
COMPUTERWORLD AUGUST 4 TH 2003.
CONCLUSION :
Steganography tools are becoming abundant and very easy to
use. Many Internet sites offer free downloadable software.
Often, although it is not necessary, the hidden messages will
be encrypted. Encryption paired with steganography creates an
extra layer of privacy. The security of the system depends
upon the assumption that the enemy has full knowledge of the
design and details of the steganography. The missing
information is the secret key. The success of steganography is
dependent upon selecting the proper cover mechanism. Law
enforcement agents are becoming very concerned about the
use of steganography in criminal activity today. In the future,
steganography will be more widely used and become a threat
to corporations, law enforcement, and governments. Terrorists
in the world will continue to communicate through the use of
steganography. These messages will be not be easily detected.
Unpopular web pages may hold images that contain hidden
messages of the next terrorist attack. As the economy
continues to slump and the job markets decline, fearful
employees of job loss may pass confidential corporate
information to competitors for payoffs or a new job proposal.
Insider trading and stock tips can be passed securely without
interception from the SEC. Drug and gambling activity has
moved off the streets and onto the Internet, making it easier to
communicate worldwide.
Most data-hiding systems take advantage of human
perceptual weaknesses, but have weaknesses of their own. We
conclude that for now, it seems that no system of data-hiding is
totally immune to attack. However, steganography has its place in
security. It in no way can replace cryptography, but is intended to
supplement it. Its application in watermarking and fingerprinting,
for use in detection of unauthorised, illegally copied material, is
continually being realised and developed. Also, in places where
standard cryptography and encryption is outlawed, steganography
can be used for covert data transmission. Steganography, formerly
just an interest of the military, is now gaining popularity among the
masses. Soon, any computer user will be able to put his own
watermark on his artistic creations.
We know that technology ideas and methods have room
for improvement. Steganography methods will be examined and
new ideas of "how to" will emerge. Transmission methods will be
perfected to ensure data integrity and transfer. New media will be
discovered to hide information. Better detection methods will be
discovered. Steganography today is just the "ice cap" of what
steganography will be in the future.
[5] A RESEARCH PAPER SUBMITTED AT SANS INSTITUTE IN 2003 AS PART OF
GIAC PRACTICAL REPOSITORY.
.
REFERENCES
[1] Kipper, Greg “Investigator’s Guide to Steganography” Auerbach
Publications, 2004
[2] Fridrich, Goljan, Du. “Reliable Detection of LSB Steganography in Color
and Grayscale Images”
ISSN: 2231-5381
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