Enhanced Image Steganography with PVD and Edge Detection

Steganography is the concept of concealing information or data by embedding it as secret data into various digital medias in order to achieve higher security. Many S teganographic algorithms are proposed for this. The ability of human eyes as well as invisibility remain the most important and prominent factor for the security and protection. The most commonly used security measure of data hiding within images (Image Steganography) is the Least Significant Bit (LSB) system.Yet it is ineffective against steganalysis, and lacks proper verifications. Thus the proposed system of Image Steganography using PVD (Pixel Value Differentiating) proves to be a better choice. It compresses and embeds data in images at the pixel value difference calculated between two consecutive pixels. To increase the security, another technique called Edge Detection is used along with PVD to embed data at the edges. Edge Detection techniques like Canny algorithm are used to find the edges in an image horizontally as well as vertically. The edge pixels in an image can be used to handle more bits of messages, because more pixel value shifts can be handled by the image edge area.