INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL FOR TRENDS IN ENGINEERING & TECHNOLOGY

VOLUME 3 ISSUE 3 MARCH 2015 ISSN: 2349 9303

Dual Steganography for Hiding Video in Video

P. Selvigrija (Assistant Professor)1

E. Ramya (Student)2

Department of Computer Science and Engineering,

Christ College of Engineering and Technology, Puducherry,
India
grijapst@gmail.com

Department of Computer Science and Engineering,

Christ College of Engineering and Technology, Puducherry,
India
ramya_0629@pec.edu

Abstract Dual Steganography is the process of using Steganography combined with Cryptography. Steganography is
the process of hiding confidential datas in the media files such as audio, images, videos, etc. Cryptography is a branch of
mathematics concerned with the study of hiding and revealing information and for proving authorship of messages. In this
paper, the Dual Steganography concept has been applied to secure the original videos from unauthorized person. The
process has been done by embedding the original video inside another video. Both the videos are converted into frames
first. After that, the individual frames of original video are sampled with the frames of another video. After completing the
sampling process, the output frames are combined to obtain the encrypted video.
Index Terms Cryptography, Dual Steganography, Embedding, Frames, Original video, Steganography.

INTRODUCTION

TEGANOGRAPHY derives from the Greek word, Steganos,

which means coated or secret, and, Graphy means that writing
or drawing [1] [9]. On the best level, steganography is hidden
writing, whether or not it consists of invisible ink on paper or
copyright data hidden in an audio file. Today, steganography is very
frequently related to information hidden with different information
in an electronic file. This can be typically done by replacing those
least necessary or very redundant bits of information within the
original file [10]. Wherever Cryptography scramble a message into a
code to obscure its meaning, steganography hides the message
entirely.

Since man first started communication over written messages,

the necessities for secrecy were in high demand. Within the past,
messages may simply be intercepted and since there have been no
secrecy devices; the third party were able to browse the message.
This all modified throughout the time of the Greeks, around five
hundred B.C., once Demaratus initial used the technique of
Steganography. Steganography is the method of hiding a message,
thus it's sort of a message doesn't exist at all. Demaratus was a
Greek national, lived in Persia as a result of he was banished from
the Balkan state. Whereas in Persia, he witnessed Xerxes, the leader
of the Persians, build one of the greatest naval fleets the world has
ever known. Xerxes utilized this fleet to attack the Balkan state
during an onset. Demaratus still felt a love for his motherland and
determined he ought to warn the Balkan state regarding the key
attack. He knew it might be onerous to send the message over to
The Balkan state while not it being intercepted. This can be once he
came up with the concept of employing a wax pill to cover his
message. Demaratus knew that blank wax tablets can be sent to The
Balkan state while not anyone being the wiser. To cover his
message, he scraped all the wax off from the pill exploits solely the
wood from beneath. He scraped his message into the wood and once
he finished, recovered the wood with the wax. The wax coated his
message and it gave the impression of it absolutely were simply a
blank wax pill. Demaratus message was hidden and he sent this to
the Balkan state. The hidden message was never discovered by the

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Persians and with success created it to The Balkan state. Due to this
message, the Balkan state was able to defeat the incursive Persian
force. The opposite techniques used for hiding information in past
days are clean-shaven head technique, clear ink technique and thru
coddled egg.
The word cryptography originated from 2 Greek words,
Kryptos which means secret and Graphy which means writing;
hence it virtually means secret writing [2] [7]. Especially,
cryptography could be thought of as the science of secret writing,
aiming at protecting information such that the receiver only can able
to decipher and browse the message. A cryptographic system or
crypto-system consists of 2 complementing functions, cryptography
and secret writing. Cryptography operates on plaintext to rework it
into unintelligible type supported input key. Secret writing instead
operates on cipher text to recover the first message victimisation the
secret writing key. Cryptography and secret writing keys are similar
to parallel crypto-system and completely different from uneven
crypto-system. Whereas cryptography means the science of securing
knowledge, the scientific discipline is that the science of analyzing
and breaking secure communication. Cryptanalysts are referred to as
attackers. Science embraces each cryptography and scientific
discipline.
Video Steganography may be technique to cover secrete files
into a carrying video file [10]. The employment of the video
primarily based steganography is additional eligible than different
transmission files as of its size and memory necessities. Videos are
the set of pictures. Video is an electronic medium for the recording,
repetition and broadcasting of moving visual pictures. The average
number of still images per unit of time of video is twenty four
frames per second.

LITERATURE SURVEY

Tanmay Bhattacharya, Nilanjan Dey and S. R. Bhadra

Chaudhuri [1] proposed Steganographic technique for hiding
multiple images in a colour image based on Discrete Wavelet
Transform (DWT) and Discrete Cosine Transform (DCT). The

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VOLUME 3 ISSUE 3 MARCH 2015 ISSN: 2349 9303
cover image is decomposed into three separate colour planes namely
R, G and B. Individual planes are decomposed into sub-bands using
DWT. DCT is applied in HH component of each plane. Secrete
images are dispersed among the selected DCT coefficients using a
pseudo random sequence and a session key. Since only selected high
frequency components are modified for the hiding method, therefore
there should be a constraint on the secrete image size.
Umashankar Dewangan, Monisha Sharma and Swagota Bera
[2] made a development and analysis on stego image using Discrete
Wavelet Transform. The message bits are embedded randomly into
the cover image pixels. First the image is converted from
time/spatial domain to frequency domain. After that, embedding
process is done using DWT algorithm. The Mean Square Error
(MSE) and Peak Signal to Noise Ratio (PSNR) are calculated for
both cover image and stego image.
Nilanjan Dey, Anamitra Bardhan Roy and Sayantan Dey [3]
proposed an approach of colour image hiding using RGB colour
planes and DWT. The colour image is hidden in the different sub
bands of the cover images separate colour planes. There will be a
minute visual adjustment in between cover image and stego image.
This approach can be applied for audio steganography.
Preeti Chaturvedi and R. K. Bairwa [4] have proposed a data
hiding scheme that hides data into the integer wavelet coefficients of
an image. The system combines a data hiding technique and the
optimum pixel adjustment algorithm to increase the hiding capacity
of the system compared to other systems. This system hides secret
data in a random order using a secret key only known to both sender
and receiver. This method is only applicable on coloured image and
grey scaled image still not applicable on audio, video and other
biometrics yet.
Shikha Sharda and Sumit Budhiraja [5] had done a
performance analysis of image steganography based on DWT is
done by using different wavelets. This method is associated with
both coloured and gray scale images. The Arnold Transform along
with private key has been used in this algorithm which provides
high security to the system.
Ashish Chawla and Pranjal Shukla [6] proposed a modified
secure and high capacity based steganography scheme of hiding a
large-size secret image into a very short cover image. Matrix
Rotation is performed to scramble the secret image. Discrete
Wavelet Transform is performed in both images and followed by
Alpha blending operation. Finally the Inverse Discrete Wavelet
Transform (IDWT) is applied to obtain the stego image.
Prabakaran Ganesan and R. Bhavani [7] proposed a high
secure steganography scheme for hiding a grey secrete image into a
gray cover image with different combination of Discrete Wavelet
Transform and Integer Wavelet Transform (IWT). Pixel Value
Adjustment (PVA) is first performed on cover image. The secret
image values are scrambled by using Arnold transform. The DWT
/IWT are applied on both cover and scrambled secret image.
Blending process is applied to both images and compute Inverse
DWT/IWT on the same to obtain the stego image. The extraction
model is indeed the reverse process of the embedding model.

algorithms. One algorithm is to divide the image into blocks and

after that, each block is shuffled within the image. The other
algorithm is Arnold transformation which will apply on the shuffled
image iteratively. This approach encrypts the image two times. First
the images are scrambled using an algorithm and the transformation
is done using key.
Vijay Kumar Sharma and Vishal Shrivastava [9] proposed a
steganographic algorithm based on Logical operation. The algorithm
embeds MSB of the secrete image into LSB of cover image. The n
LSB of the cover image is replaced by the n MSB of the secrete
image. The MSE and PSNR values are calculated for both the cover
image and secrete image.
Ketki Thakre and Nehal Chitaliya [10] proposed a highly
secured data hiding technique where steganography is used inside
steganography. The proposed method embeds data in two cover
images using four bit LSB technique. The secret data is hidden in
binary form in two cover images due to which double protection has
been added to confidential data which can be text, image audio, or
video.

PROPOSED WORK

The secrete video is embedded inside another Video using the

concept of Dual Steganography without affecting the quality of the
cover video. By using this concept:

Large amount of video can be stored since embedding is done

between two video files. Hence increase the storage capacity of
the video file.
High level security will be given to video since the secrete
video is first scrambled using a private key and after that,
embedded with cover video.
Quality of cover video will not be affected.

The process is done by embedding the original video inside

another video. Both the videos are converted into frames first. After
that, the individual frames of original video are sampled with the
frames of another video. After completing the sampling process, the
output frames are combined to obtain the encrypted stego video.

OVERALL ARCHITECTURE

The general architecture consists of two phases:

1. Hiding Video in Video (Encryption)
2. Retrieval of original Video (Decryption)

4.1 Overall Design For Encryption

In Encryption architecture, first the cover video and secrete
video are converted into a sequence of frames by extracting them.
Each extracted frame represents an image. After that, the frames of
the secrete video which has to be embedded inside the cover video
file is first encrypted using the Arnold Transformation method. The
Arnold Transformation is the process of scrambling the pixels of
each image into unrecognizable form. After that, the encrypted
frames are embedded with the cover frames to obtain Stego frames.
These stego frames are combined to obtain a Stego Video.

Pavan Kumar Goswami, Namita Tiwari and Meenu Chawla

[8] proposed an encryption algorithm which used two different

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VOLUME 3 ISSUE 3 MARCH 2015 ISSN: 2349 9303
The modules are:
A. Encryption process
B. Decryption process

5.1 Module 1: Encryption Process

The steps involved in the encryption process are:
1.
2.
3.

i.

Extracting frames from video

Encrypting secrete video frames using
Transformation
Embedding secrete image inside image frames

Arnold

Extracting frames from video

The original video (cover video) is converted into a sequence

of frame. Each frame represents an image.

Fig. 1. Overall Design for Encryption

4.2 Overall Design for Decryption

Fig. 3. Extracting frames from video
In Decryption Architecture, first the Stego Video containing
hidden video is converted into a sequence of Stego frames by
extracting them. Each extracted frame represents a Stego image.
After that, the secrete frames are separated from the original frames.
The extracted secrete frames will be in the form of encrypted
images. These encrypted images are decrypted using the Arnold
Transformation method. After decrypting each frame, all the frames
is combined to obtain original secrete video.

ii.

Encrypting secrete
Transformation

video

frames

using

Arnold

Each frame of the secrete video are encrypted using Arnold

Transformation Method. The Arnold Transformation is the process
of scrambling each pixel in an image into an unpredictable form.
Each pixel represents a block. The blocks are shuffled iteratively
with the aid of the private key. The fig 4 given below shows an
example of Arnold Transformation.

(a)

(b)

Fig. 2. Overall Design for Decryption

MODULE DESCRIPTION

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(c)
Fig. 4. (a) Secrete frame, (b) Blocks of Secrete frame,
(c) Shuffled Secrete frame

iii.

The wavelet transform describes a multi-resolution

decomposition process in terms of expansion of an Image onto a set
of wavelet basis functions. Discrete Wavelet Transformation has its
own excellent space frequency localization properly. Applying
DWT in 2D images corresponds to 2D filter image processing in
each dimension. The input image is divided into 4 non-overlapping
multi-resolution sub-bands by the filters, namely (LL1), (LH1),
(HL1) and (HH1). The sub-band (LL1) is processed further to obtain
the consequent coarser scale of wavelet coefficients, until certain
final scale N is reached. When N is reached, there will be 3N+1
sub-bands consisting of the multi-resolution sub-bands (LLX) and
(LHX), (HLX) and (HHX) where X ranges from 1 until N.
Generally, a large amount of the Image energy is stored in these
sub-bands.

Embedding secrete image inside image frames

Fig. 7. Three phase decomposition using DWT

A 2-dimensional DWT comprises of two operations: one is
horizontal operation and other is vertical operation.
Step 1:
Fig. 5. Embedding process for Single Image
The embedding of cover image over secrete image is done
using an Alpha Blend method. Before embedding process, the cover
image and encrypted secrete images are decomposed using Discrete
Wavelet Transform method. After that, the Alpha Blend technique is
applied to those images. After embedding, a single embedded image
will be obtained. After that, Inverse Discrete Wavelet Transform
(IDWT) operation is performed to that embedded image. The finally
obtained image is considered as Stego Image. This process is done
to all the frames and a sequence of Stego frames is grouped to
obtain a Stego Video.

i.

First scan the pixels from left to right in horizontal

direction.
ii. Perform the addition and subtraction operations on
neighbouring pixels and store sum on the left and
difference on the right and repeat this until all the rows
were processed.
iii. Sum represents the low frequency area (L) and difference
represents high frequency area (H) of the original image.
Step 2:
i.
ii.

Scan the pixels from top to bottom in vertical direction.

Perform addition and subtraction on neighbouring pixels,
and store the sum on top and the difference on bottom.
iii. Repeat this until all the columns were processed.
iv. Finally 4 sub- bands obtained known as LL, LH, HL and
HH.
v. The LL sub- band is a low frequency band and is much
similar to the original image.
vi. This is known as the approximation sub- band, as it is an
approximation of the original image. LL sub- band can be
decomposed further to obtain higher level DWT. LH, HL,
HH will be the detailed vertical, horizontal, diagonal subbands, respectively.

Fig. 6. Stego Video

Discrete Wavelet Transform (DWT):

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VOLUME 3 ISSUE 3 MARCH 2015 ISSN: 2349 9303
Fig. 10. Extracting frames from Stego video

ii.

Separating encrypted frames from stego frames:

Fig. 8 Horizontal operation on first row

Fig. 9. Vertical operation

Fig. 11. Obtaining Secrete image frames

Alpha Blend Technique:

Alpha Blend technique is the way of mixing the two images
together to form a final image. Alpha Blending can be accomplished
in computer graphics by blending each pixel of the cover image with
the corresponding pixel in the secrete image. The equation for
executing alpha blending is as follows:
Final pixel = alpha * (First image's source pixel) +
(1.0-alpha) * (Second image's source pixel)
The blending factor or percentage of colours from the first
source image used in the blended image is called the "alpha." The
alpha used in algebra is in the range 0.0 to 1.0, instead of 0 to 100%.

5.2 Module 2: Decryption Process

The extraction of secrete image from Stego image is done by

Alpha Blend method. Before extracting the secrete image, the cover
image and stego image is decomposed using DWT method. After
that, the Alpha Blend operation is performed with those two
decomposed images. After that, IDWT technique is applied to that
blended image to obtain the encrypted secrete image. Using the
private key, the scrambled image is decrypted and the secrete image
frame is obtained. By repeating this process, a collection of secrete
image frames are obtained.

iii.

Getting Secrete video:

The sequence of secrete image frames are combined to obtain

the final secrete video.

The steps involved in the encryption process are:

i. Extracting frames from Stego video
ii. Separating encrypted frames from stego frames
iii. Getting Secrete video

i.

Extracting frames from Stego video:

The frames are extracted from Stego video as done for the
encryption process.
Fig. 12. Getting Secrete video

CONCLUSION

In this paper, the Arnold Transformation, Discrete Wavelet

Transform and Alpha Blend method has been introduced in hiding
Secrete Video inside Video. The three important algorithms used for
secrete video encryption; image decomposition and image
embedding are the Arnold Transformation, Discrete Wavelet
Transform and an Alpha Blend method respectively. The works start
with extracting frames from cover video and secrete video. After
that, the encryption of the image takes place using the Arnold
Transformation. After encryption of image frames, the scrambled

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VOLUME 3 ISSUE 3 MARCH 2015 ISSN: 2349 9303
frames and cover frames are decomposed using DWT method and
embedded using an Alpha Blend method. Finally, Stego frames will
be produced. Later, the Stego Frames are combined to obtain a
Stego Video. This technique provides a high level security to the
Secrete Video and the quality of stego video will be equal to the
cover video. Since the scrambling method is used for image
encryption, it will be difficult for the intruders to decrypt the image
frames.

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