A joint spatial texture analysis/watermarking system for digital image authentication

A watermarking system ensures the reliability of images transmitted over public networks by asserting their authenticity. The texture property of host image is one of the most interesting characteristics that can be exploited to design image authentication systems. The importance of texture property emerged from the principles of Human Visual System (HVS), where modifying the spatial pixels of highly textured regions within host image increases the imperceptibility and the robustness against different image processing attacks. Many efficient features known in the literature are used to define the texture property of host image, but all of them are intangible. The model proposed in this paper suggests to solve this intangibility by applying one of Multi-Criteria Decision Making (MCDM) methods, in order to define highly textured blocks within host image to hold the secret data. The proposed model has been tested on grayscale image and the experiments result shows high level of imperceptibility and robustness against different singular and hybrid attacks.