Embedding Limitations with Digital-audio Watermarking Method Based on Cochlear Delay Characteristics

We comparatively evaluated the proposed approach for inaudible audio watermarking with four typical methods (LSB, DSS, ECHO, and PPM) by carrying out objective (PEAQ and LSD) and subjective (inaudibility) evaluations, bit-detection test, and robustness tests (signal modifications and StirMark benchmark). The results of evaluations revealed that subjects could not detect the embedded data in any of the watermarked signals we used, and that the proposed approach could precisely and robustly detect the embedded data from the watermarked signals. We also investigated embedding limitations with our proposed method and improved the method by designing a parallel architecture for cochlear delay filters. We then evaluated our proposed and improved methods to investigate embedding limitations by carrying out five tests: LSD, PEAQ, bit-detection, and two robustness tests (signal modifications and StirMark benchmark). The results revealed that the methods could be used to inaudibly embed the watermarks into original signals and to accurately and robustly detect the embedded data from the watermarked signals. We also found that embedding limitations with the improved method (M = 8) amounted to 384 bps while that with our proposed method (M = 2) amounted to 128 bps.

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