Pictures Worth More Than 1000 Words STEGANOGRAPHY: Hiding Data in Images Presented By: Olena Vikariy and Andrew Cavanaugh Image: Metamorphose II M.C. Escher
What is Steganography? From the Greek “steganos” meaning covered and “graphy” meaning writing or drawing The process of hiding information, data, messages, etc. in digital media Originates from the Greek prisoner, Histiaeus, who tattooed a fellow prisoner’s head with a message and sent to his army.
What Kinds of Files can be Used to Hide In? Most used today: Images: .bmp, .gif, .jpg/.jpeg Sound files: .wav Text files: .txt, .doc Other: .html, .xml
A Few Key Words and Phrases Cover Image: the image in which the data will be hidden; carrier image, overt or host file Covert Data: refers to the data that has been hidden in the image Stego-image, -carrier, -medium: an image that contains hidden data Steganalysis: the process of detecting and finding data hidden by steganography techniques
Steganography Techniques Most used today: Image Domain: Least Significant Bit (LSB) - substitution based; the 1st or 2nd LSB are changed; visually identical to original image; 24-bit images provide better cover than an 8-bit image Transform Domain: spreads the data throughout the image and performs a second layer transform; Discrete Cosine Transform (DCT) used by JPEGs
How is Steganography Applied? Covert Information Transfer (i.e. Spy stuff, Government communication) Copyright Protection: digital watermarking Convenient storage and transmission of multiple media Future Possibility: use in holograms on credit cards as a means of identification; currently very expensive to produce
Some Useful References: Various Papers on Steganography: http://www.foresnsics.nl/steganography List of various steganographic tools: http://stegoarchive.com (most free and some commercial) Book: Hiding in Plain Sight: Steganography and the Art of Covert Communication by Eric Cole