LKAW: A Robust Watermarking Method Based on Large Kernel Convolution and Adaptive Weight Assignment

Robust watermarking requires finding invariant features under multiple attacks to ensure correct extraction.Deep learning has extremely powerful in extracting features,and watermarking algorithms based on deep learning have attracted widespread attention.Most existing methods use 3×3 small kernel convolution to extract image features and embed the watermarking.However,the effective perception fields for small kernel convolution are extremely confined,so the pixels that each watermarking can affect are restricted,thus limiting the performance of the watermarking.To address these problems,we propose a watermarking network based on large kernel convolution and adaptive weight assignment for loss functions.It uses large-kernel depth-wise convolution to extract features for learning large-scale image information and subsequently projects the watermarking into a highdimensional space by 1×1 convolution to achieve adaptability in the channel dimension.Subsequently,the modification of the embedded watermarking on the cover image is extended to more pixels.Because the magnitude and convergence rates of each loss function are different,an adaptive loss weight assignment strategy is proposed to make theweights participate in the network training together and adjust theweight dynamically.Further,a high-frequency wavelet loss is proposed,by which the watermarking is restricted to only the low-frequency wavelet sub-bands,thereby enhancing the robustness of watermarking against image compression.The experimental results show that the peak signal-to-noise ratio(PSNR)of the encoded image reaches 40.12,the structural similarity(SSIM)reaches 0.9721,and the watermarking has good robustness against various types of noise.

Robust Watermarking of Mobile Video Resistant against Barrel Distortion

In head mounted display(HMD),in order to cancel pincushion distortion,the images displayed on the mobile should be prewarped with barrel distortion.The copyright of the mobile video should be verified on both the original view and the pre-warped virtual view.A robust watermarking resistant against barrel distortion for HMDs is proposed in this paper.Watermark mask is embedded into image in consideration of imperceptibility and robustness of watermarking.In order to detect watermark from the pre-warped image with barrel distortion,an estimation method of the barrel distortion is proposed for HMDs.Then,the same warp is enforced on the embedded watermark mask with the estimated parameters of barrel distortion.The correlation between the warped watermark and the pre-warped image is computed to predicate the existence of watermark.As shown in experimental results,watermark of mobile video can be detected not only from the original views,but also from the pre-warped virtual view.It also shows that the proposed scheme is resistant against combined barrel distortion and common post-processing,such as JPEG compression.

An Error-Correcting Code-Based Robust Watermarking Scheme for Stereolithographic Files

Stereolithographic(STL)files have been extensively used in rapid prototyping industries as well as many other fields as watermarking algorithms to secure intellectual property and protect three-dimensional models from theft.However,to the best of our knowledge,few studies have looked at how watermarking can resist attacks that involve vertex-reordering.Here,we present a lossless and robust watermarking scheme for STL files to protect against vertexreordering attacks.Specifically,we designed a novel error-correcting code(ECC)that can correct the error of any one-bit in a bitstream by inserting several check digits.In addition,ECC is designed to make use of redundant information according to the characteristics of STL files,which introduces further robustness for defense against attacks.No modifications are made to the geometric information of the three-dimensional model,which respects the requirements of a highprecision model.The experimental results show that the proposed watermarking scheme can survive numerous kinds of attack,including rotation,scaling and translation(RST),facet reordering,and vertex-reordering attacks.

Robust Watermarking of Screen-Photography Based on JND

With the popularity of smartphones,it is often easy to maliciously leak important information by taking pictures of the phone.Robust watermarking that can resist screen photography can achieve the protection of information.Since the screen photo process can cause some irreversible distortion,the currently available screen photo watermarks do not consider the image content well and the visual quality is not very high.Therefore,this paper proposes a new screen-photography robust watermark.In terms of embedding region selection,the intensity-based Scale-invariant feature transform(SIFT)algorithm used for the construction of feature regions based on the density of feature points,which can make it more focused on the key content of the image;in terms of embedding strength,the Just noticeable difference(JND)model is applied to limit the intensity of the watermark embedding according to the luminance and texture of the picture to balance robustness and invisibility;after embedding watermark,the coefficients in the neighborhood are again adjusted with optimal constraints to improve the accuracy of watermark extraction.After experiments,it is shown that the method we proposed can improve the correct rate of watermark extraction,the quality of the visual aspect of the watermarked picture is also improved.

Novel Blind Robust Watermarking Based on Chaotic Mixing

This paper proposed a novel blind robust watermarking scheme. Multi-bits watermark is embedded in the chaotic mixed image blocks. Energy of the watermark is spread to all region of the blocks instead of some individual pixels, which entitles the watermark with imperceptibility and high robustness. A class of 1-D Markov chaotic maps is employed to perform image block mixing and watermark encryption ensures security of the system. To prove the validity of this proposed scheme, some objective comparisons with the popular spread spectrum scheme were also presented. The simulation results show that this scheme can survive processing such as high-ratio JPEG compression, Gaussian noise pollution and histogram equalization.

A Dual Domain Robust Reversible Watermarking Algorithm for Frame Grouping Videos Using Scene Smoothness

The proposed robust reversible watermarking algorithm addresses the compatibility challenges between robustness and reversibility in existing video watermarking techniques by leveraging scene smoothness for frame grouping videos.Grounded in the H.264 video coding standard,the algorithm first employs traditional robust watermark stitching technology to embed watermark information in the low-frequency coefficient domain of the U channel.Subsequently,it utilizes histogram migration techniques in the high-frequency coefficient domain of the U channel to embed auxiliary information,enabling successful watermark extraction and lossless recovery of the original video content.Experimental results demonstrate the algorithm’s strong imperceptibility,with each embedded frame in the experimental videos achieving a mean peak signal-to-noise ratio of 49.3830 dB and a mean structural similarity of 0.9996.Compared with the three comparison algorithms,the performance of the two experimental indexes is improved by 7.59%and 0.4%on average.At the same time,the proposed algorithm has strong robustness to both offline and online attacks:In the face of offline attacks,the average normalized correlation coefficient between the extracted watermark and the original watermark is 0.9989,and the average bit error rate is 0.0089.In the face of online attacks,the normalized correlation coefficient between the extracted watermark and the original watermark is 0.8840,and the mean bit error rate is 0.2269.Compared with the three comparison algorithms,the performance of the two experimental indexes is improved by 1.27%and 18.16%on average,highlighting the algorithm’s robustness.Furthermore,the algorithm exhibits low computational complexity,with the mean encoding and the mean decoding time differentials during experimental video processing being 3.934 and 2.273 s,respectively,underscoring its practical utility.

A Robust 3-D Medical Watermarking Based on Wavelet Transform for Data Protection

In a telemedicine diagnosis system,the emergence of 3D imaging enables doctors to make clearer judgments,and its accuracy also directly affects doctors’diagnosis of the disease.In order to ensure the safe transmission and storage of medical data,a 3D medical watermarking algorithm based on wavelet transform is proposed in this paper.The proposed algorithm employs the principal component analysis(PCA)transform to reduce the data dimension,which can minimize the error between the extracted components and the original data in the mean square sense.Especially,this algorithm helps to create a bacterial foraging model based on particle swarm optimization(BF-PSO),by which the optimal wavelet coefficient is found for embedding and is used as the absolute feature of watermark embedding,thereby achieving the optimal balance between embedding capacity and imperceptibility.A series of experimental results from MATLAB software based on the standard MRI brain volume dataset demonstrate that the proposed algorithm has strong robustness and make the 3D model have small deformation after embedding the watermark.

Robust Image Watermarking Using Local Invariant Features and Independent Component Analysis

This paper proposes a novel robust image watermarking scheme for digital images using local invariant features and Independent Component Analysis （ICA）. Most present watermarking algorithms are unable to resist geometric distortions that desynchronize the location. The method we propose here is robust to geometric attacks. In order to resist geometric distortions, we use a local invariant feature of the image called the scale invariant feature transform, which is invariant to translation and scaling distortions. The watermark is inserted into the circular patches generated by scale-invariant key point extractor. Rotation invariance is achieved using the translation property of the polar-mapped circular patches. Our method belongs to the blind watermark category, because we use Independent Component Analysis for detection that does not need the original image during detection. Experimental results show that our method is robust against geometric distortion attacks as well as signal-processing attacks.

Robust watermarking of databases in order-preserving encrypted domain

Security of databases has always been a hot topic in the field of information security.Privacy protection can be realized by encrypting data,while data copyright can be protected by using digital watermarking technology.By combining these two technologies,a database’s copyright and privacy problems in the cloud can be effectively solved.Based on order-preserving encryption scheme(OPES),circular histogram and digital watermarking technology,this paper proposes a new robust watermarking scheme for protection of databases in the encrypted domain.Firstly,the OPES is used to encrypt data to avoid exposing the data in the cloud.Then,the encrypted data are grouped and modified by the use of a circular histogram for embedding a digital watermark.The common data query operations in database are available for the encrypted watermarking database.In receivers,the digital watermark and the original data can be restored through a secret key and a key table.Experimental results have shown that the proposed algorithm is robust against common database attacks in the encrypted domain.

WATERMARKING AUTHENTICATION:USING THE FRAGILE MODE OR THE ROBUST MODE?

Due to the lack of a unified authentication model certain mistakes occurred in the use of the wa-termarking authentication methods. To clarify the confusion, authentication models of robust and fragile wa-termarking are developed respectively in the paper. Concrete algorithms are proposed to prove the models that different Discrete Wavelet Transform (DWT) domains are utilized to embed the watermarks and quanti-zation method is presented with Just Notice Differences (JNDs) threshold as the quantization size. After the key technologies about the two methods are discussed, we detail the comparison of the two modes and rec-ommend their respective application scenarios as applicable results.

Robust Reversible Audio Watermarking Scheme for Telemedicine and Privacy Protection

The leakage of medical audio data in telemedicine seriously violates the privacy of patients.In order to avoid the leakage of patient information in telemedicine,a two-stage reversible robust audio watermarking algorithm is proposed to protect medical audio data.The scheme decomposes the medical audio into two independent embedding domains,embeds the robust watermark and the reversible watermark into the two domains respectively.In order to ensure the audio quality,the Hurst exponent is used to find a suitable position for watermark embedding.Due to the independence of the two embedding domains,the embedding of the second-stage reversible watermark will not affect the first-stage watermark,so the robustness of the first-stage watermark can be well maintained.In the second stage,the correlation between the sampling points in the medical audio is used to modify the hidden bits of the histogram to reduce the modification of the medical audio and reduce the distortion caused by reversible embedding.Simulation experiments show that this scheme has strong robustness against signal processing operations such as MP3 compression of 48 db,additive white Gaussian noise(AWGN)of 20 db,low-pass filtering,resampling,re-quantization and other attacks,and has good imperceptibility.

Robust Image Watermarking Based on Generative Adversarial Network

Digital watermark embeds information bits into digital cover such as images and videos to prove the creator’s ownership of his work.In this paper,we propose a robust image watermark algorithm based on a generative adversarial network.This model includes two modules,generator and adversary.Generator is mainly used to generate images embedded with watermark,and decode the image damaged by noise to obtain the watermark.Adversary is used to discriminate whether the image is embedded with watermark and damage the image by noise.Based on the model Hidden(hiding data with deep networks),we add a high-pass filter in front of the discriminator,making the watermark tend to be embedded in the mid-frequency region of the image.Since the human visual system pays more attention to the central area of the image,we give a higher weight to the image center region,and a lower weight to the edge region when calculating the loss between cover and embedded image.The watermarked image obtained by this scheme has a better visual performance.Experimental results show that the proposed architecture is more robust against noise interference compared with the state-of-art schemes.

A robust tensor watermarking algorithm for diffusion-tensor images

Watermarking algorithms that use convolution neural networks have exhibited good robustness in studies of deep learning networks.However,after embedding watermark signals by convolution,the feature fusion eficiency of convolution is relatively low;this can easily lead to distortion in the embedded image.When distortion occurs in medical images,especially in diffusion tensor images(DTIs),the clinical value of the DTI is lost.To address this issue,a robust watermarking algorithm for DTIs implemented by fusing convolution with a Transformer is proposed to ensure the robustness of the watermark and the consistency of sampling distance,which enhances the quality of the reconstructed image of the watermarked DTIs after embedding the watermark signals.In the watermark-embedding network,Ti-weighted(Tlw)images are used as prior knowledge.The correlation between T1w images and the original DTI is proposed to calculate the most significant features from the T1w images by using the Transformer mechanism.The maximum of the correlation is used as the most significant feature weight to improve the quality of the reconstructed DTI.In the watermark extraction network,the most significant watermark features from the watermarked DTI are adequately learned by the Transformer to robustly extract the watermark signals from the watermark features.Experimental results show that the average peak signal-to-noise ratio of the watermarked DTI reaches 50.47 dB,the diffusion characteristics such as mean diffusivity and fractional anisotropy remain unchanged,and the main axis deflection angleαAc is close to 1.Our proposed algorithm can effectively protect the copyright of the DTI and barely affects the clinical diagnosis.

A robust color image watermarking algorithm against rotation attacks

A robust digital watermarking algorithm is proposed based on quaternion wavelet transform(QWT) and discrete cosine transform(DCT) for copyright protection of color images. The luminance component Y of a host color image in YIQ space is decomposed by QWT, and then the coefficients of four low-frequency subbands are transformed by DCT. An original binary watermark scrambled by Arnold map and iterated sine chaotic system is embedded into the mid-frequency DCT coefficients of the subbands. In order to improve the performance of the proposed algorithm against rotation attacks, a rotation detection scheme is implemented before watermark extracting. The experimental results demonstrate that the proposed watermarking scheme shows strong robustness not only against common image processing attacks but also against arbitrary rotation attacks.

Watermarking through image geometry change tracking

Most of the digital image watermarking techniques are susceptible to geometric attacks such as cropping,rotation and scaling.These attacks are the easiest yet most successful in rendering the survival of watermark difficult.Such geometric operations alter the pixel orientation in the cover thereby rendering the watermark difficult to locate and extract.However,if the alterations produced by the geometric attacks such as scaling,cropping and rotation can be modeled in terms of the change in the image geometry,it is possible to relocate the watermark even after the original cover has suffered an attack.This paper contributes to the state of the art by proposing an image watermarking technique that attempts to model the attacks like cropping,scaling and rotation in terms of the image geometry.The proposed scheme is acceptably resistant to common geometric attacks and common image processing attacks.The watermark embedding is also done efficiently to offer resistance to image processing attacks.The watermark detection procedure is blind and key based,also not requiring the original cover work for watermark extraction.Efforts have been given to ensure that the proposed scheme conforms to robustness against attacks and exhibits high visual fidelity of the watermarked cover.

Data Hiding in the Division Domain:Simultaneously Achieving Robustness to Scaling and Additive Attacks

Data hiding plays an important role in privacy protection and authentication,but most data hiding methods fail to achieve satisfactory performance in resisting scaling attacks and additive attacks.To this end,this paper proposes a new quantization index modulation(QIM)variant based on division domains(D-QIM).It can not only resist the above two attacks well,but also adjust the performance trade-offs by controlling the parameters.Simulation results confirm the performance gain of D-QIM in terms of the bit error rate(BER).