A perception evaluation scheme for steganography

Abstract

The aim of steganography is to conceal the very existence of hidden communication, so its demand on invisibility is serious. However there are not any corresponding perception evaluation methods. Most researchers still use Peak-Signal-to-Noise Rate (PSNR) for their perception evaluation, while ignoring the speciality of steganography. In this paper, we present an objective method of perception evaluation, which based on both characteristics of steganography and human visual systems (HVS). Extensive experimental results demonstrate that our method is superior to PSNR, which is consistent with HVS and can effectively evaluate the performance of steganographic algorithm. © Springer-Verlag 2003.