Secret Image Sharing and Steganography based on Fuzzy Logic and Prediction Error

Abstract

Transmitting data through the internet may have severe security risks due to illegal access done by attackers. Some methods have been introduced to overcome this issue, such as cryptography and steganography. Nevertheless, some problems still arise, such as the quality of the stego data. Specifically, it happens if the stego is shared with some users. In this research, a shared-secret mechanism is combined with steganography. For this purpose, the fuzzy logic edge detection and Prediction Error (PE) methods are utilized to hide private data. The secret sharing process is carried out after data embedding in the cover image. This sharing mechanism is performed on image pixels that have been converted to PE values. Various Peak Signal to Noise Ratio (PSNR) values are obtained from the experiment. It is found that the number of participants and the threshold do not significantly affect the image quality of the shares.