Increasing the data hiding capacity and improving the security of a double-random phase-encoding technique based information hiding scheme

A double-random phase-encoding technique based information hiding scheme was analyzed and improved. By encoding the hidden image with the double-random phase-encoding technique, and embedding the encoded image into the enlarged host image to generate the composed image, the original scheme can recover the hidden image from the composed image directly (i.e., without using the original host image) with satisfying quality. For the proposed improved scheme, 3 values (other than 2 values as in the original scheme) are embedded into each 2 × 2 block within the enlarged host image, resulting in increasing the data hiding capacity around 50%, while not influence the qualities of the composed image and the reconstructed hidden image seriously. In addition, the security of the original scheme is enhanced markedly. Theoretical analysis and experimental results demonstrate the effectiveness of the improved scheme.