An Adaptive Steganographic Method in Frequency Domain Based on Statistical Metrics of Image

Abstract

Steganography is a branch of information hiding. A tradeoff between the hiding payload and quality of digital image steganographic schemes is major challenge of the steganographic methods. An adaptive steganographic method for embedding secret message into gray scale images is proposed. Before embedding the secret message, the cover image is transformed into frequency domain by integer wavelet. The middle frequency band of cover image is partitioned into 4×4 non overlapping blocks. The blocks by deviation and entropy metrics are classified into three categories: smooth, edge, and texture regions. Number of bits which can be embedded in a block is defined by block features. Moreover, RC4 encryption method is used to increase secrecy protection. Experimental results denote the feasibility of the proposed method. Statistical tests were conducted to collect related data to verify the security of method.