Title: Steganographic manipulations with elliptic curve cryptography

Authors: T.N. Shankar; G. Sahoo; S. Niranjan

Addresses: Department of Computer Science and Engineering, GMR Institute of Technology, Rajam-532127, Srikakulam, AP, India. ' Department of Information Technology, Birla Institute of Technology, Mesra-835215, Ranchi, Jharkhand, India. ' Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Prabhu Dayal Memorial College of Engineering, Bahadurgarh-124507, Jhajjar, Haryana, India.

Abstract: Steganography is a technique of hiding the existence of information in some other data evincing no trace of data alteration. The term has its origin from Greek that literally means 'covered writing'. Unlike cryptography, which simply conceals the content or meaning of a message, steganography conceals the very existence of a message. In computer-based steganography, several forms of digital media are used as 'cover' for hidden information. Images, documents, web pages, and even MP3 music files may all serve as innocuous-looking hosts for secret messages. In cases of covert communications through internet, digital images due to their ability to carry hidden messages are possibly the most practical type of steganographic methodologies. Most of the steganography-based techniques are within the domain of private key encryption algorithms with the less security level rather than using public key algorithms. An attempt to create the secret code for image steganography for multimedia messaging service or MMS using elliptic curve cryptography has been demonstrated.

Keywords: elliptic curve cryptography; ECC; least significant bit; LSB; pixels; image steganography; multimedia messaging service; MMS; encryption; decryption; carrier file; steganographic manipulations; covert communications; hidden messages.

DOI: 10.1504/IJESDF.2012.049762

International Journal of Electronic Security and Digital Forensics, 2012 Vol.4 No.4, pp.280 - 297

Received: 20 May 2011
Accepted: 24 May 2012
Published online: 19 Nov 2014 *

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