Cover Image Preprocessing for More Reliable LSB Replacement Steganography

Abstract

We propose a simple method for preprocessing of cover images to increase the reliability of LSB replacement steganography in digital images. After the preprocessing of cover images, most reliable steganalysis methods in the literature such as RS steganalysis, Sample pair method, and Least Square method estimate embedding ratio as almost 100% for any amount of hidden data. Thus it causes inaccurate estimation results by the most reliable LSB steganalysis methods thereby increasing the reliability of LSB replacement steganography. The preprocessing is based on the count of different types of sample pairs in the image and their subsequent change with embedding.