Performance evaluation of data hiding techniques

Fast evaluation of digital data exchange occurs in recent years. Due to that security of information is much important in data storage and transmission process. In this paper we present a comparison of two techniques for data hiding. In first techniques we are generating the encryption key using rand command in Matlab and then hiding it using LSB substitution method. In the second technique we are encrypting the image using AES algorithm and hiding this in DCT of carrier image. Performance of both the techniques is studied. The advantage of the first method is that every time when we use rand command it generates a new key, so it will not be easy to decrypt the image if the proper key is not there. It was observed that in AES method requires more time for execution compared to other method but then the PSNR value is high for AES. Hence the reconstructed image is better in AES.