File forensics for RAW camera image formats

Recent research in multimedia forensics has developed a variety of methods to detect image tampering and to identify the origin of image files. Many of these techniques are based on characteristics in the JPEG format, as it is the most used file format for digital images. In recent years RAW image formats have gained popularity among amateur and professional photographers. This increase in their use and possible misuse makes these file formats an important subject to file forensic examinations. The aim of this paper is to explore to which extend methods previously developed for images in JPEG format can be applied to RAW image formats

TrusNet: Peer-to-Peer Cryptographic Authentication

Originally, the Internet was meant as a general purpose communication protocol, transferring primarily text documents between interested parties. Over time, documents expanded to include pictures, videos and even web pages. Increasingly, the Internet is being used to transfer a new kind of data which it was never designed for. In most ways, this new data type fits in naturally to the Internet, taking advantage of the near limit-less expanse of the protocol. Hardware protocols, unlike previous data types, provide a unique set security problem. Much like financial data, hardware protocols extended across the Internet must be protected with authentication. Currently, systems which do authenticate do so through a central server, utilizing a similar authentication model to the HTTPS protocol. This hierarchical model is often at odds with the needs of hardware protocols, particularly in ad-hoc networks where peer-to-peer communication is prioritized over a hierarchical model. Our project attempts to implement a peer-to-peer cryptographic authentication protocol to be used to protect hardware protocols extending over the Internet. The TrusNet project uses public-key cryptography to authenticate nodes on a distributed network, with each node locally managing a record of the public keys of nodes which it has encountered. These keys are used to secure data transmission between nodes and to authenticate the identities of nodes. TrusNet is designed to be used on multiple different types of network interfaces, but currently only has explicit hooks for Internet Protocol connections. As of June 2016, TrusNet has successfully achieved a basic authentication and communication protocol on Windows 7, OSX, Linux 14 and the Intel Edison. TrusNet uses RC-4 as its stream cipher and RSA as its public-key algorithm, although both of these are easily configurable. Along with the library, TrusNet also enables the building of a unit testing suite, a simple UI application designed to visualize the basics of the system and a build with hooks into the I/O pins of the Intel Edison allowing for a basic demonstration of the system

WCAM: secured video surveillance with digital rights management

The WCAM project aims to provide an integrated system for secure delivery of video surveillance data over a wireless network, while remaining scalable and robust to transmission errors. To achieve these goals., the content is encoded in Motion-JPEG2000 and streamed with a specific RTP protocol encapsulation to prevent the loss of packets containing the most essential data. Protection of the video data is performed at content level using the standardized JPSEC syntax along with flexible encryption of quality layers or resolution levels. This selective encryption respects the JPEG2000 structure of the stream, not only ensuring end-to-end ciphered delivery, but also enabling dynamic content adaptation within the wireless network (quality of service, adaptation to the user's terminal). A DRM (Digital Rights Management) solution, called OpenSDRM is added to manage all authenticated peers on the WLAN (from end-users to cameras), as well as to manage the rights to access and display conditionally the video data. This whole integrated architecture addresses several security problems such as data encryption, integrity, access control and rights management. Using several protection lavers, the level of confidentiality can depend both on content characteristics and user rights, thus also addressing the critical issue of privacy.info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio

A SECURED AUTHENTICATED WATERMARKING TECHNIQUE

Whenever media contents transmitted through the network, compressed and encrypted media data is used so it is important to give proper protection to the data items to avoid unauthorized access and for that we need to enhance media authentication and for that the compressed encrypted media data which is used to distribute through the network is watermarked for providing proof of ownership or distributorship. For doing compression JPEG 2000 compression and while doing compression the data is packed to  low  number of bits and to this data encryption is applied so  stream cipher technique is used for avoiding media quality degradation and also this technique allow to do watermarking in a predictable manner. And a robust watermarking algorithm is used for watermarking this compressed and encrypted media data

Survey of the Use of Steganography over the Internet

This paper addressesthe use of Steganography over the Internet by terrorists. There were ru-mors in the newspapers that Steganography is being used to covert communication between terrorists, without presenting any scientific proof. Niels Provos and Peter Honeyman conducted an extensive Internet search where they analyzed over 2 million images and didn’t find a single hidden image. After this study the scientific community was divided: some believed that Niels Provos and Peter Honeyman was conclusive enough other did not. This paper describes what Steganography is and what can be used for, various Steganography techniques and also presents the studies made regarding the use of Steganography on the Internet.Steganography, Secret Communication, Information Hiding, Cryptography

Steganography-based secret and reliable communications: Improving steganographic capacity and imperceptibility

This thesis was submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy and awarded by Brunel University.Unlike encryption, steganography hides the very existence of secret information rather than hiding its meaning only. Image based steganography is the most common system used since digital images are widely used over the Internet and Web. However, the capacity is mostly limited and restricted by the size of cover images. In addition, there is a tradeoff between both steganographic capacity and stego image quality. Therefore, increasing steganographic capacity and enhancing stego image quality are still challenges, and this is exactly our research main aim. Related to this, we also investigate hiding secret information in communication protocols, namely Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP) message, rather than in conventional digital files. To get a high steganographic capacity, two novel steganography methods were proposed. The first method was based on using 16x16 non-overlapping blocks and quantisation table for Joint Photographic Experts Group (JPEG) compression instead of 8x8. Then, the quality of JPEG stego images was enhanced by using optimised quantisation tables instead of the default tables. The second method, the hybrid method, was based on using optimised quantisation tables and two hiding techniques: JSteg along with our first proposed method. To increase the steganographic capacity, the impact of hiding data within image chrominance was investigated and explained. Since peak signal-to-noise ratio (PSNR) is extensively used as a quality measure of stego images, the reliability of PSNR for stego images was also evaluated in the work described in this thesis. Finally, to eliminate any detectable traces that traditional steganography may leave in stego files, a novel and undetectable steganography method based on SOAP messages was proposed. All methods proposed have been empirically validated as to indicate their utility and value. The results revealed that our methods and suggestions improved the main aspects of image steganography. Nevertheless, PSNR was found not to be a reliable quality evaluation measure to be used with stego image. On the other hand, information hiding in SOAP messages represented a distinctive way for undetectable and secret communication.The Ministry of Higher Education in Syria and the University of Alepp

Forensic analysis of video file formats

AbstractVideo file format standards define only a limited number of mandatory features and leave room for interpretation. Design decisions of device manufacturers and software vendors are thus a fruitful resource for forensic video authentication. This paper explores AVI and MP4-like video streams of mobile phones and digital cameras in detail. We use customized parsers to extract all file format structures of videos from overall 19 digital camera models, 14 mobile phone models, and 6 video editing toolboxes. We report considerable differences in the choice of container formats, audio and video compression algorithms, acquisition parameters, and internal file structure. In combination, such characteristics can help to authenticate digital video files in forensic settings by distinguishing between original and post-processed videos, verifying the purported source of a file, or identifying the true acquisition device model or the processing software used for video processing