Audio or video steganography

• US 6,266,430 B1
• Filed: 03/08/2000
• Issued: 07/24/2001
• Est. Priority Date: 11/18/1993
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Digimarc Corporation
• Original Assignee: Digimarc Corporation
• Inventors: Rhoads, Geoffrey B.
• Primary Examiner(s): Johns, Andrew W.
• Application Number:
  US09/520,406
• Time in Patent Office: 503 Days
• Field of Search: 382/100, 382/232, 380/210, 380/287, 380/54, 380/31, 380/42, 380/252, 704/200.1, 704/270, 704/273, 381/73.1, 370/527, 370/528, 370/529
• US Class Current: 382/100
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/1235 with control of digital rights management [DRM]
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/306 using TV related infrastructures external card used for payment with client device H04N21/4185
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/341 Active cards, i.e. cards including their own processing means, e.g. including an IC or chip
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/40145 Biometric identity checks
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 1/0028 Adaptive watermarking, e.g. Human Visual System [HVS]-based watermarking
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 1/005 Robust watermarking, e.g. average attack or collusion attack resistant
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 1/0057 Compression invariant watermarking
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 2201/0052 Embedding of the watermark in the frequency domain
• CPC Class Codes: G07C 9/253 visually
• CPC Class Codes: G07D 7/0032 using holograms
• CPC Class Codes: G07D 7/004 using digital security elements, e.g. information coded on a magnetic thread or strip
• CPC Class Codes: G07F 17/26 for printing, stamping, franking, typing or teleprinting apparatus ticket printing or the like apparatus G07F17/42
• CPC Class Codes: G07F 7/08 by coded identity card or credit card or other personal identification means without personal verification means G07F7/02
• CPC Class Codes: G07F 7/086 by passive credit-cards adapted therefor, e.g. constructive particularities to avoid counterfeiting, e.g. by inclusion of a physical or chemical security-layer for security documents G07D7/00; for the reading of record-carriers in general G06K7/00; for the design of coded credit-cards G06K19/10
• CPC Class Codes: G07F 7/1008 Active credit-cards provided with means to personalise their use, e.g. with PIN-introduction/comparison system
• CPC Class Codes: G07F 7/1016 Devices or methods for securing the PIN and other transaction-data, e.g. by encryption arrangements for secret communication, see H04L9/00
• CPC Class Codes: G07F 7/12 Card verification
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 19/018 Audio watermarking, i.e. embedding inaudible data in the audio signal
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 19/022 Blocking, i.e. grouping of samples in time; Choice of analysis windows; Overlap factoring
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 20/00086 Circuits for prevention of unauthorised reproduction or copying, e.g. piracy indicating unauthorised use of record carriers in general G11B23/28; scrambling for television signal recording H04N5/913; network architectures or network protocols for network security H04L63/00; cryptographic mechanisms or cryptographic arrangements for secret or secure communication H04L9/00
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 20/00094 : involving measures which result in a restriction to authorised record carriers
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 20/00115 : wherein the record carrier stores a unique medium identifier
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 20/00166 : involving measures which result in a restriction to authorised contents recorded on or reproduced from a record carrier, e.g. music or software
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 20/00181 : using a content identifier, e.g. an international standard recording code [ISRC] or a digital object identifier [DOI]
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 20/0021 : involving encryption or decryption of contents recorded on or reproduced from a record carrier
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 20/00231 : wherein the key is obtained from a local external medium, e.g. a card
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 20/00492 : wherein content or user data is encrypted
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 20/00884 : involving a watermark, i.e. a barely perceptible transformation of the original data which can nevertheless be recognised by an algorithm
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 20/00891 : embedded in audio data
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 1/665 : using psychoacoustic properties of the ear, e.g. masking effect
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/00005 : relating to image data
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/00037 : Detecting, i.e. determining the occurrence of a predetermined state H04N1/00031 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/00079 : remotely
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/32128 : attached to the image data, e.g. file header, transmitted message header, information on the same page or in the same computer file as the image for information embedded in the image H04N1/32144
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/32144 : embedded in the image data, i.e. enclosed or integrated in the image, e.g. watermark, super-imposed logo or stamp
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/32203 : Spatial or amplitude domain methods H04N1/32309 takes precedence
• 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 1/32288 : Multiple embedding, e.g. cocktail embedding, or redundant embedding, e.g. repeating the additional information at a plurality of locations in the image
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 2005/91321 : the copy protection signal being a copy protection control signal, e.g. a record inhibit signal
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 2005/91335 : the copy protection signal being a watermark
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 2201/3205 : of identification information, e.g. name or ID code H04N2201/3209 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 2201/3207 : of an address
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 2201/3225 : of data relating to an image, a page or a document
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 2201/3226 : of identification information or the like, e.g. ID code, index, title, part of an image, reduced-size image
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 2201/3233 : of authentication information, e.g. digital signature, watermark
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 2201/3246 : of data relating to permitted access or usage, e.g. level of access or usage parameters for digital rights management [DRM] related to still images
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 2201/3249 : data relating to a linked page or object, e.g. hyperlink
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 2201/327 : which are undetectable to the naked eye, e.g. embedded codes
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 2201/3271 : Printing or stamping
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 2201/3278 : Transmission
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 2201/328 : Processing of the additional information
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 5/913 : for scrambling ; for copy protection
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/08 : Systems for the simultaneous or sequential transmission of more than one television signal, e.g. additional information signals, the signals occupying wholly or partially the same frequency band , e.g. by time division H04N7/007 takes precedence

Abstract

An input content signal—representing audio or video—is encoded to hide plural-bit auxiliary data therein. The process generates an intermediate signal that is a function of (a) the plural-bit auxiliary data, and (b) data related to human perception attributes of the content signal. This intermediate signal is then summed with the content signal to effect encoding. The plural-bit auxiliary data can include copy control data, i.e., data that can be sensed by a consumer electronic device and used to disable a copying operation. The intermediate signal may include a pseudorandom key signal so as to obscure the encoding and require knowledge of a corresponding key at the decoder to extract the auxiliary data from the encoded content. In some embodiments, calibration data is encoded in the content signal with the auxiliary data. This calibration data desirably has known properties (e.g., spectral attributes, data content, etc.) facilitating its identification in the encoded content signal. The encoding is desirably robust against various forms of content degradation, e.g., lossy compression/decompression, scaling, resampling, conversion from digital to analog and back again, etc., so that the auxiliary data can be detected from the content notwithstanding such corruption.

Claims

1. A method of processing audio or video data, comprising:

providing input content data, the content data representing audio or video and comprising plural samples, each having a value;

providing plural symbol auxiliary data that is to be steganographically encoded within the content data, to yield encoded content data;

receiving first data related to human perception attributes of the content data;

generating intermediate data that is a function of said plural symbol auxiliary data and said first data, the intermediate signal including an element corresponding to each of plural of the content data samples;

steganographically encoding the content data with the auxiliary data by changing the values of samples in a version of the input content data in accordance with elements of the intermediate signal corresponding thereto, thereby yielding the encoded content data;

wherein there exists first and second neighboring samples in the encoded content data;

both of which samples are encoded in accordance with a first symbol of the auxiliary data;

the first sample of which is additionally encoded in accordance with a second, different symbol of the auxiliary data; and

the second sample of which is additionally encoded in accordance with a third, different symbol of the auxiliary data.

2. A storage medium having stored thereon encoded content data produced according to the method of claim 1.

3. A method of processing audio or video data, comprising:

providing input content data, the content data representing audio or video and comprising plural samples, each having a value;

providing plural symbol auxiliary data that is to be steganographically encoded within the content data, to yield encoded content data;

receiving first data related to human perception attributes of the content data;

generating intermediate data that is a function of said plural symbol auxiliary data and said first data, the intermediate signal including an element corresponding to each of plural of the content data samples;

steganographically encoding the content data with the auxiliary data by changing the values of samples in a version of the input content data in accordance with elements of the intermediate signal corresponding thereto, thereby yielding the encoded content data;

wherein there exists first and second adjoining samples in the encoded content data for which the first sample is encoded in accordance with one, and only one, symbol of the auxiliary data, and the second sample is encoded in accordance with plural symbols of the auxiliary data.

4. The method of claim 3 in which one of the symbols with which the second sample is encoded is the same symbol with which the first sample is encoded.

5. The method of claim 4 that further includes:

decoding auxiliary data from a version of the encoded content data; and

controlling a record capability of an associated apparatus in accordance with at least a portion of the decoded auxiliary data.

6. The method of claim 5 in which the associated apparatus is a video apparatus.

7. The method of claim 5 in which the associated apparatus is an audio apparatus.

8. The method of claim 5 that includes decoding at least a portion of the auxiliary data from the encoded content by performing statistical analyses on data related to the encoded content.

9. A storage medium having stored thereon encoded content data produced according to the method of claim 3.

10. A method of processing audio or video data, comprising:

providing input content data, the content data representing audio or video and comprising plural samples, each having a value;

providing plural symbol auxiliary data that is to be steganographically encoded within the content data, to yield encoded content data;

receiving first data related to human perception attributes of the content data;

generating intermediate data that is a function of said plural symbol auxiliary data and said first data, the intermediate signal including an element corresponding to each of plural of the content data samples;

steganographically encoding the content data with the auxiliary data by changing the values of samples in a version of the input content data in accordance with elements of the intermediate signal corresponding thereto, thereby yielding the encoded content data;

wherein generating the intermediate data includes generating a noise-like signal by processing the plural symbol auxiliary data with a set of key data, and controlling the amplitude of the noise-like signal in accordance with said first data.

11. The method of claim 10 in which the plural symbol auxiliary data includes copy control data.

12. The method of claim 11 in which the plural symbol auxiliary data includes other data that is not copy control data.

13. The method of claim 10 that further includes:

decoding auxiliary data from a version of the encoded content data; and

controlling a record capability of an associated apparatus in accordance with at least a portion of the decoded auxiliary data.

14. The method of claim 13 in which the associated apparatus is a video apparatus.

15. The method of claim 13 in which the associated apparatus is an audio apparatus.

16. The method of claim 13 that includes decoding at least a portion of the auxiliary data from the encoded content by performing statistical analyses on data related to the encoded content.

17. The method of claim 10 that further includes decoding the plural-symbol auxiliary data from a corrupted version of the encoded content data notwithstanding said corruption, wherein the corrupted version of the encoded content data is the encoded content data corrupted by converting same from digital to analog form, and back again to digital.

18. The method of claim 10 that further includes decoding the plural-symbol auxiliary data from a corrupted version of the encoded content data notwithstanding said corruption, wherein the corrupted version of the encoded content data is the encoded content data corrupted by compressing/decompressing same by a lossy process.

19. The method of claim 10 that further includes decoding the plural-symbol auxiliary data from a corrupted version of the encoded content data notwithstanding said corruption, wherein the corrupted version of the encoded content data is the encoded content data corrupted by a process selected from a group consisting of:

misregistration of the encoded content data and scaling of the encoded content data.

20. A storage medium having stored thereon encoded content data produced according to the method of claim 10.

21. A method of processing audio or video data, comprising:

providing input content data, the content data representing audio or video and comprising plural samples, each having a value;

providing plural symbol auxiliary data that is to be steganographically encoded within the content data, to yield encoded content data;

receiving first data related to human perception attributes of the content data;

generating intermediate data that is a function of said plural symbol auxiliary data and said first data, the intermediate signal including an element corresponding to each of plural of the content data samples;

steganographically encoding the content data with the auxiliary data by changing the values of samples in a version of the input content data in accordance with elements of the intermediate signal corresponding thereto, thereby yielding the encoded content data;

compressing a first content signal;

decompressing the compressed signal;

assessing a result of said compression and decompression operations; and

using information obtained through said assessment in performing said steganographic encoding.

22. A computer storage medium having stored thereon encoded content data produced according to the method of claim 21.

23. The method of claim 21 in which the first data comprises information that is to be used in said encoding.

24. The method of claim 21 which comprises assessing degradation through said compression and decompression operations.

25. The method of claim 21 which comprises assessing degradation of the first content signal through said compression and decompression operations.

26. The method of claim 21 which comprises using the first content signal, after said compression and decompression, as watermark data to be combined with said content data.

27. The method of claim 21 in which the first content signal comprises initial data that has been processed in accordance with pseudo-random data.

28. The method of claim 21 in which the first content signal represents said plural-symbol auxiliary data.