Data Hiding in Media

• US 20080112590A1
• Filed: 01/22/2008
• Published: 05/15/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 01/18/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Digimarc Corporation
• Original Assignee: Digimarc Corporation
• Inventors: Stach, John
• Granted Patent: US 7,532,741 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 382/100
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 1/0064 Geometric transfor invariant watermarking, e.g. affine transform invariant
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 2201/0051 Embedding of the watermark in the spatial domain
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/32149 Methods relating to embedding, encoding, decoding, detection or retrieval operations
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/32154 Transform domain methods H04N1/32309 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/32187 with selective or adaptive application of the additional information, e.g. in selected frequency coefficients
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/32208 involving changing the magnitude of selected pixels, e.g. overlay of information or super-imposition H04N1/32219, H04N1/32224 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/32229 with selective or adaptive application of the additional information, e.g. in selected regions of the image H04N1/32213 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/32251 in multilevel data, e.g. greyscale or continuous tone data
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/32309 in colour image data
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 2201/327 which are undetectable to the naked eye, e.g. embedded codes

Abstract

The present invention provides steganographic embedding and detecting techniques, along with related apparatus. One claim recites a signal detector including: an input and an analyzer. The input obtains media including a signal hidden therein. The signal including plural-bit data, the signal being hidden in the media through an arrangement of message objects. The arrangement is facilitated—at least in part—through thresholding of a steganographic signal representing or carrying the plural-bit data. The analyzer analyzes the media to obtain the plural-bit data. Of course, other combinations are provided and claimed as well.

Claims

1. An apparatus comprising:

electronic processing circuitry; and

memory comprising instructions for execution via said electronic processing circuitry, said instructions comprising instructions to;

obtain a steganographic signal;

threshold the steganographic signal to yield a set of points; and

arrange objects in accordance with the set of points to represent the steganographic signal.

2. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein said instructions to arrange utilize a transform domain.

3. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein the set of points correspond to points in a transform domain.

4. A physical document including at least a surface and a hidden signal carried on or in the surface, the hidden signal comprising a set of positions identified through reducing a steganographic signal to the set of positions, the set of positions comprising location positions corresponding to the surface, wherein objects are arranged on or in the surface according to the set of positions to convey the hidden signal.

5. The document of claim 4 wherein the document comprises an image.

6. The document of claim 4 wherein the document comprises a photo-mosaic.

7. The document of claim 6, wherein the objects comprise photographs.

8. An apparatus comprising:

electronic processing circuitry; and

memory comprising instructions for execution via said electronic processing circuitry, said instructions comprising instructions to;

obtain a steganographic signal including data;

reduce the steganographic signal to yield a set of transform domain placement positions, the set of transform domain placement positions comprising a placement map; and

arranging message objects in a host signal according to the placement map, whereby the data is obtainable from analysis of the host signal.

9. The apparatus of claim 8, wherein once arranged, the objects convey the steganographic signal.

10. The apparatus of claim 9, further comprising instructions to arrange non-message objects to form an image or design, the non-message objects differing from the message object in at least one of color, contrast, gray-scale or luminance.

11. The apparatus of claim 8 wherein the host signal comprises at least an image or video.

12. A method comprising:

identifying a set of features in a plural-bit steganographic signal, the set of features comprising less features than contained in the steganographic signal;

altering a host signal to include a representation of the set of features, whereby the plural-bits of the steganographic signal are detectable from machine-analysis of the set of features.

13. A computer-readable medium comprising circuitry or instructions to perform the method of claim 12.

14. The method of claim 12 wherein said act of altering comprises altering data corresponding to the host signal in a frequency domain.

15. The method of claim 12 wherein the host signal comprises at least an image or video.

16. A signal detector comprising:

an input to obtain media comprising a signal hidden therein, the signal including plural-bit data, the signal being hidden in the media through an arrangement of message objects, the arrangement being facilitated—

at least in part—

through thresholding of a steganographic signal representing or carrying the plural-bit data; and

an analyzer to analyze the media to obtain the plural-bit data.

17. The signal detector of claim 16 further comprising:

electronic processing circuitry, and

memory, said memory comprising instructions for execution via said electronic processing circuitry, the instructions comprising instructions to facilitate the input and analyzer.

18. The signal detector of claim 17 with said analyzer utilizing a frequency domain transform.

19. The signal detector of claim 16 with said analyzer utilizing a frequency domain transform.

20. The signal detector of claim 16 wherein the media comprises at least an image or video.