Image Steganography using Index based Chaotic Mapping

There have been many techniques for hiding messages in images in such a manner that the alterations made to the image are perceptually indiscernible. The Least-significant bit (LSB)-based approach is the most popular type of steganographic algorithm. However, we find that in most existing approaches the choice of embedding positions within the cover image are not secure enough. In this paper, we have used 1D chaotic logistic map to generate the pseudo random numbers; the index values of the sorted pseudo random numbers are the positions used to embed the message in the cover image. This technique provides sufficient security as the same set of numbers cannot be generated without knowing the exact key and thus the message is more secure. The proposed technique has been applied and tested successfully on various images producing significant results.