16590165
New Public-Key Authentication Watermarking for JBIG2 Resistant to Parity Attacks
An authentication watermark is a hidden data inserted into an image that allows detecting any alteration made in the image. AWTs (Authentication Watermarking Techniques) normally make use of secret- or public-key cryptographic cipher to compute the authentication signature of the image, and inserts it into the image itself. Many previous public-key AWTs for uncompressed binary images can be attacked by an image adulterating technique named “parity attack.” JBIG2 is an international standard for compressing bi-level images (both lossy and lossless). The creation of secure AWTs for compressed binary images is an important practical problem. However, it seems that no AWT for JBIG2 resistant to parity attacks has ever been proposed. This paper proposes a new data-hiding method to embed information in the text region of JBIG2 files. Then, we use this technique to design a new AWT for JBIG2-encoded images resistant to parity attacks. Both the secret- and public-key versions of the proposed AWT are completely immune against parity attacks. Moreover, watermarked images are visually pleasant, without visible salt and pepper noise. Image authenticity verification can be performed in either JBIG2 file itself or in the binary image obtained by decoding the JBIG2 file.
6853667
Efficient Algorithms for Pairing-Based Cryptosystems
We describe fast new algorithms to implement recent cryptosystems based on the Tate pairing. In particular, our techniques improve pairing evaluation speed by a factor of about 55 compared to previously known methods in characteristic 3, and attain performance comparable to that of RSA in larger characteristics. We also propose faster algorithms for scalar multiplication in characteristic 3 and square root extraction over Fpm, the latter technique being also useful in contexts other than that of pairing-based cryptography.
3147895
Pitfalls in public key watermarking
The cryptographic concept of digital signatures is well suited to image watermarking for authentication and integrity verification. However, the peculiar nature of watermarks demands special care in the application of digital signatures for this purpose. We cryptanalyze a recently proposed watermarking scheme and show how it can be strengthened to thwart our attacks, exploring the use of hashing function contexts and signature algorithms based on elliptic curve cryptography.
15509328
New features for affine-invariant shape classification
An object seen from different viewpoints results in differently deformed images. Affine-invariant shape classification must classify correctly the object, regardless its viewpoint. In this paper, we propose new local and global features invariant under affine transformation. These features can be used for supervised or unsupervised shape classification, and for shape-based image indexing and retrieval. One of the proposed features is related to the convex deficiency and the others are extracted from the area matrix. Area matrix was used by Shen for the similarity matching in image retrieval. However, differently from the Shen's work, we parameterize the shape contour using the affine-length parameter. This makes our features robust to affine parameterization, while Shen's work does not have this property. Experimental results indicate that our method can classify correctly even highly deformed and noisy shapes using small training sets.
13935279
Robust anisotropic diffusion to produce clear statistical parametric map from noisy fMRI
Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) uses MRI to noninvasively map areas of increased neuronal activity in human brain without the use of an exogenous contrast agent. Low signal-to-noise ratio of fMRI images makes it necessary to use sophisticated image processing techniques, such as statistical parametric map (SPM), to detect activated brain areas. This paper presents a new technique to obtain clear SPM from noisy fMRI data. It is based on the robust anisotropic diffusion. A direct application of the anisotropic diffusion to fMRI does not work, mainly due to the lack of sharp boundaries between activated and non-activated regions. To overcome this difficulty, we propose to calculate SPM from noisy fMRI, compute diffusion coefficients in the SPM space, and then perform the diffusion in fMRI images using the coefficients previously computed. These steps are iterated until the convergence. Experimental results using the new technique yielded surprisingly sharp and noiseless SPMs.
4790058
A public-key authentication watermarking for binary images
Authentication watermarking is the process that inserts hidden data into an object (image) in order to detect any fraudulent alteration perpetrated by a malicious hacker. In the literature, quite a small number of secure authentication methods are available for binary images. This paper proposes a new secure authentication watermarking method for binary images. It can detect any visually significant alteration while maintaining good visual quality. As usual, the security of the algorithm lies on the secrecy of a private-key. Only its owner can insert the correct watermark while anyone may verify the authenticity through the corresponding public-key. A possible application of the proposed technique is in Internet fax transmission, i.e. for legal authentication of documents routed outside the phone network.
4644097
Component-based LDA face description for image retrieval and MPEG-7 standardisation
We propose a method of face description for facial image retrieval from a large data base and for MPEG-7 (Moving Picture Experts Group) standardisation. The novel descriptor is obtained by decomposing a face image into several components and then combining the component features. The decomposition combined with LDA (Linear Discriminant Analysis) provides discriminative facial descriptions that are less sensitive to light and pose changes. Each facial component is represented in its Fisher space and another LDA is then applied to compactly combine the features of the components. To enhance retrieval accuracy further, a simple pose classification and transformation technique is performed, followed by recursive matching. Our algorithm has been developed to deal with the problem of face image retrieval from huge databases such as those found in Internet environments. Such retrieval requires a compact face representation which has robust recognition performance under lighting and pose variations. The partitioning of a face image into components offers a number of benefits that facilitate the development of an efficient and robust face retrieval algorithm. Variation in image statistics due to pose and/or illumination changes within each component region can be simplified and more easily captured by a linear encoding than that of the whole image. So an LDA encoding at the component level facilitates better classification. Furthermore, a facial component can be weighted according to its importance. The component with a large variation is weighted less in the matching stage to yield a more reliable decision. The experimental results obtained on the MPEG-7 data set show an impressive accuracy of our algorithm as compared with other methods including conventional PCA (Principal Component Analysis)/ICA (Independent Component Analysis)/LDA methods and the previous MPEG-7 proposals.
6362737
Further progress in watermark evaluation testbed (WET)
While Digital Watermarking has received much attention in recent years, it is still a relatively young technology. There are few accepted tools/metrics that can be used to evaluate the suitability of a watermarking technique for a specific application. This lack of a universally adopted set of metrics/methods has motivated us to develop a web-based digital watermark evaluation system called the Watermark Evaluation Testbed or WET. There have been more improvements over the first version of WET. We implemented batch mode with a queue that allows for user submitted jobs. In addition to StirMark 3.1 as an attack module, we added attack modules based on StirMark 4.0. For a new image fidelity measure, we evaluate conditional entropy as an image fidelity measure for different watermarking algorithms and different attacks. Also, we show the results of curve fitting the Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) analysis data using the Parzen window density estimation. The curve fits the data closely while having only two parameters to estimate.
38600553
WIPI Mobile Platform with Secure Service for Mobile RFID Network Environment
Recently, RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) technology is practically applied to a number of logistics processes as well as asset management, and RFID is also expected to be permeated in our daily life with the name of ’Ubiquitous Computing’ or ‘Ubiquitous Network’ within the near future. The R&D groups in global now have paid attention to integrate RFID with mobile devices as well as to associate with the existing mobile telecommunication network. Such a converged technology and services would lead to make new markets and research challenges. However, the privacy violation on tagged products has become stumbling block. We propose light-weight security mechanism which is constructed by mobile RFID security mechanism based on WIPI (Wireless Internet Platform for Interoperability). WIPI-based light-weight mobile RFID security platform can be applicable to various mobile RFID services that required secure business applications in mobile environment.
6043201
MOQ: Web services ontologies for QoS and general quality evaluations
When describing web services, one of the obvious aspects that need representing is 'Quality of Service' (QoS), the capability of a web service to meet an acceptable level of service as per factors such as availability and accessibility. However, too much of a focus on developing functional QoS ontologies has led to an over-emphasis on representing solely QoS metrics and units of measurement. For instance, what does round trip time actually mean? Is the round trip time of every data item measured? Is it an average, or is every nth item measured? Is it the actual measure that is important or just the percentage of items that are beyond a certain range? Arguably existing QoS ontologies cannot readily answer many of these design questions because these questions have less to do with evaluating QoS and more to do with representing 'what is quality?' Therefore, there is an unmet need for web services ontologies that are designed at a higher level encompassing domain independent concepts, and generally applicable beyond QoS evaluations. The MOQ set of ontologies, designed from the premise that quality is 'conformance to requirements', aims to fill this need. Comprised of ontologies of requirement, measurement, traceability, and quality management systems, MOQ can be extended to encompass QoS metrics and measurement units or be designed to interoperate with existing QoS ontology. The use of MOQ minimises the ambiguity in QoS evaluations.
32223299
Security Techniques Based on EPC Gen2 Tag for Secure Mobile RFID Network Services
RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) technology will be a ubiquitous reality in daily life in the near future. The R&D groups in global now have paid attention to integrate RFID with mobile phone devices as well as to associate with the existing mobile telecommunication network. Such a converged technology and services would lead to make new markets and research challenges. However, privacy threats on RFID tags embedded into products has become stumbling block. Therefore, this paper propose a new security technique for mobile RFID service, which can be support to secure RFID service and uses the privacy protection in mobile RFID network services.