Data Hiding Scheme for Spatial Domain Images Using Fuzzy Logic and Modulus Operation

Abstract

The concealment of secret information has become a significant concern in today's highly digitalized world due to the rapid increase in unauthorized data access and network policy violations. In response, steganography has emerged as an alternative technique for securing communication by embedding confidential information within digital files. This paper presents an enhanced scheme for hiding secret bits by utilizing fuzzy-detected edges and a modulus function applied to image pixels in the spatial domain. Unlike previous approaches that focused solely on concealing data in the image's smooth areas with limited differences, neglecting other potential values, this method addresses these limitations by considering positive and negative difference values between adjacent pixels to hide the secret data effectively. Experimental results show an average improvement of 15% in peak signal-tonoise ratio (PSNR), indicating better stego image quality and a 20% increase in embedding capacity compared to existing benchmark methods.