Moth Flame Optimization With Hybrid Lsb Embedding For Robust Image Steganography In Spatial Domain

Abstract

Data security is a major challenge in the communication environment because of the large volume of data generation where there is no security of data among the users. Hence, image steganography is introduced to ensure the security of the user sensitive information during communication. Several researchers have tried to improve the performance of steganography methods by developing various algorithms for optimal pixel selection and enhancement of image quality algorithms. The previous researchers hide the sensitive data in the transformed image coefficients randomly. But the performance of random data hiding is low. This paper presents an approach for image steganography using a Moth Flame optimization algorithm (MFO) that selects the pixel effectively. Then, a hybrid LSB (Least significant bit) algorithm is applied for secret data hiding. Here, the average pixel value differencing is computed in the optimal pixels. The pixel is considered as it is in edge area when the value is greater than 15 else; it is in a smooth area. The LSB and EMD combination is used in the smooth area pixel embedding, and the combination of LSB and PVD is used in the edge area pixel embedding. The proposed image steganography is simulated and compared with existing works. The simulation results show the performance of proposed work as well as the existing work, which clearly describes that the proposed work is robust than the current works.