Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Non-ambiguity of blind watermarking: a revisit with analytical resolution

  • Published:
Science in China Series F: Information Sciences Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Resistance to ambiguity attack is an important requirement for a secure digital rights management (DRM) system. In this paper, we revisit the non-ambiguity of a blind watermarking based on the computational indistinguishability between pseudo random sequence generator (PRSG) sequence ensemble and truly random sequence ensemble. Ambiguity attacker on a watermarking scheme, which uses a PRSG sequence as watermark, is viewed as an attacker who tries to attack a noisy PRSG sequence. We propose and prove the security theorem for binary noisy PRSG sequence and security theorem for general noisy PRSG sequence. It is shown that with the proper choice of the detection threshold Th = a √n (a is a normalized detection threshold; n is the length of a PRSG sequence) and n ⩾ 1.39 × m/a 2 (m is the key length), the success probability of an ambiguity attack and the missed detection probability can both be made negligibly small thus non-ambiguity and robustness can be achieved simultaneously for both practical quantization-based and blind spread spectrum (SS) watermarking schemes. These analytical resolutions may be used in designing practical non-invertible watermarking schemes and measuring the non-ambiguity of the schemes.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  1. Moulin P, Koetter R. Data hiding codes. Proc IEEE, 2005, 93(12): 2079–2082

    Article  Google Scholar 

  2. Cox I, Kilian J, Leighton T, et al. Secure spread spectrum watermarking for multimedia. IEEE Trans Image Process, 1997, 6(12): 1837–1687

    Article  Google Scholar 

  3. Zhao Y. Geometrically robust video water-marking based on wavelet transform. Sci China Ser F-Inf Sci, 2006, 49(3): 313–327

    Article  MATH  Google Scholar 

  4. Wu M, Liu B. Data hiding in images and video, Part I: fundamental issues and solutions. IEEE Trans Image Process, 2003, 12(6): 685–695

    Article  Google Scholar 

  5. Chen B, Wornell G W. Quantization index modulation: A class of provably good methods for digital watermarking and information embedding. IEEE Trans Inf Theory, 2001, 47(4): 1423–1443

    Article  MATH  MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

  6. Craver S, Memon N, Yeo B L, et al. Resolving rightful ownerships with invisible watermarking techniques: Limitations, attacks, and implications. IEEE J Select Areas Commun, 1998, 16(4): 573–586

    Article  Google Scholar 

  7. Adelsbach A, Katzenbeisser S, Sadeghi A -R. On the insecurity of noninvertible watermarking schemes for dispute resolving. In: Proc. of Int. Workshop on Digital Watermarking2003. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 2939. Berlin: Springer-Verlag, 2003. 374–388

    Google Scholar 

  8. Adelsbach A, Katzenbeisser S, Veith H. Watermarking schemes provably secure against copy and ambiguity attacks. In: Proc. of ACM conference on Digital Right Management2003. Washington, DC, USA. Oct. 27, 2003. 111–119

  9. Li Q, Chang E -C. On the possibility of non-invertible watermarking schemes. In: Proc. of Int. Workshop on Information Hiding 2004. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol. 3200. Berlin: Springer-Verlag, 2004. 13–24

    Google Scholar 

  10. Zeng W, Liu B. On resolving rightful ownerships of digital images by invisible watermarks. In: Proc. 4th Int. Conf. on Image Processing. Santa Barbara, CA, USA, 1997. 552–555

  11. Ramkumar M, Akansu A. Image watermarks and counterfeit attacks: some problems and solutions. In: Proc. of Sym. on Content Security and Data Hiding in Digital Media. NJIT, Newark, NJ, USA, 1999. 102–112

    Google Scholar 

  12. Sencar H T, Memon N. Watermarking and ownership problem: a revisit. In: Proc. of ACM conference on Digital Right Management 2005. Alexandria, Virginia, USA, 2005

  13. Qiao L, Nahrstedt K. Watermarking methods for MPEG encoded video: Towards resolving rightful ownership. In: Proc. of IEEE Int. Conf. on Multimedia Computing and Systems. 1998. 276–285

  14. Swanson M D, Kobaysshi M, Tewfik A H. Multimedia data embedding and watermarking technologies. Proc. IEEE, 1998, 86(6): 1064–1087

    Article  Google Scholar 

  15. Zeng W, Liu B. A statistical watermark detection technique without using original images for resolving rightful ownerships of digital images. IEEE Trans Image Process, 1999, 8(11): 1534–1548

    Article  Google Scholar 

  16. Goldreich O. Foundations of Cryptography-Baic Tools. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001

    Google Scholar 

  17. Kang X, Shi Y Q, Huang, J. Achieving non-ambiguity of quantization based watermarking. In: Proc. of SPIE: Security, Steganography, and Watermarking of Multimedia Contents 2006, vol. 6072. San Jose, CA, USA. Jan. 2006

  18. Katzenbeisser S, Veith H. Securing symmetric watermarking schemes against protocol attack. In: Proc. of SPIE, Security and Watermarking of Multimedia Content 2002, vol. 4675, 2002. 260–268

    Google Scholar 

  19. Kang X, Huang J, Shi Y Q, et al. DWT-DFT composite watermarking scheme robust to both affine transform and JPEG compression. IEEE Trans Circuits Syst Video Tech, 2003, 13(8): 776–786

    Article  Google Scholar 

  20. Perez-Freire L, Comesana-Alfaro P, Perez-Gonzalez F. Detection in quantization-based watermarking: performance and security issues. In: Proc. of SPIE: Security, Steganography, and Watermarking of Multimedia Contents 2005, vol. 5681. San Jose, USA, Jan. 2005. 721–733

  21. Eggers J J, Bäuml R, Tzschoppe R, Girod B. Scalar costa scheme for information embedding. IEEE Trans Signal Process, 2003, 51(4): 1003–1019

    Article  MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

  22. Ramkumar M, Akansu A N. A robust protocol for proving ownership of multimedia content. IEEE Trans Multimedia, 2004, 6(3): 469–478

    Article  Google Scholar 

  23. Proakis J G. Digital Communications. 4th ed. New York: McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. 2004

    Google Scholar 

  24. Li Q, Chang E -C. Zero-knowledge watermark detection resistant to ambiguity attacks. In: ACM Multimedia Security Workshop, 2006

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Information Science & Technology, Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou, 510275, China

    XianGui Kang & JiWu Huang

  2. Department of CS, University of Missouri-Columbia, Columbia, MO, 65211, USA

    WenJun Zeng

  3. Department of ECE, New Jersey Institute of Technology, New York, NJ, 07102, USA

    Yun Q. Shi

Authors
  1. XianGui Kang
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. JiWu Huang
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. WenJun Zeng
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Yun Q. Shi
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to XianGui Kang or JiWu Huang.

Additional information

Supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 90604008, 60633030, 60403045), Natural Science Foundation of Guangdong Province (Grant No. 04009742) and the National Basic Research Program of China (Grant No. 2006CB303104)

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Kang, X., Huang, J., Zeng, W. et al. Non-ambiguity of blind watermarking: a revisit with analytical resolution. Sci. China Ser. F-Inf. Sci. 52, 276–285 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11432-009-0043-7

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11432-009-0043-7

Abstract

Search

Navigation