A skin-tone block-map algorithm for efficient image steganography

Recently, information hiding in human skin regions has improved robustness of image steganography and yield better imperceptibility. In this paper, we present a skin-tone block-map algorithm for hiding data in colored images. A skin-tone map is generated from the host image using a skin-tone detection algorithm that is based on the pixel color information. The skin-tone map is then converted to a skin-tone block-map, which is used for hiding the secret data. Moreover, the embedding process is carried out in the wavelet domain and the extraction is carried out blindly. Experimental results and comparisons with related work show the efficiency of the proposed method and its resistance to attacks such as JPEG compression.