Performance Analysis of Data Hiding Using Adjacent Pixel Difference Technique

Steganography aims at hiding a text/message in an image in such a way that only receiver knows its existence. A natural image has many smooth areas. In recent years, various techniques are used for hiding data in the smooth areas of the image using digital image processing with varying degree of goodness. The prime goal is to enhance the data hiding capacity without much deteriorating the quality of the picture under consideration. Locating the best position in an image that will achieve the desired goal is a critical design issue. This work attempts to deal with this issue and analyses the impact of data hiding on high edge density and low edge density areas on some of the standard benchmark images. The underlying steganography algorithm used is Adjacent Pixel Difference (APD) technique available in literature. The simulation results reveal that the performance parameter PSNR tends to deteriorate in high density edge area as compared to low edge density area as the image block size area is varied.