The information technology era or the third industrial revolution began around the 1960s; has changed the ways we live, work, and play; and brought substantial challenges that include loss of privacy, fake news, digital divides, and significant information security risks. With billions of connections and systems, security vulnerabilities are abundant including the opportunity for criminals to exploit any gaps that present themselves. Eventually, we'll need a groundbreaking technology to gain the upper hand against these threats. Protecting data, systems, and networks assumed a more specific term: cybersecurity. The goal of cybersecurity today is to protect information while it's at rest and in motion. One of the most interesting ways to deliver hidden information is through steganographic technique.
TopIntroduction
Quantum cryptography is an approach to securing communications by way of applying the phenomena of quantum physics. Unlike conventional classical cryptography, which makes use of mathematical strategies to restrict eavesdroppers, quantum cryptography is targeted at the physics of statistics. Quantum cryptography presents relaxed verbal exchange, whose safety depends simplest on the validity of quantum theory that means it is guaranteed without delay by means of the legal guidelines of physics. This is a great distinction from any classical cryptographic techniques. This article summarizes the cutting-edge kingdom of quantum cryptography and gives potential extensions of its feasibility as a mechanism for securing current structures.
Quantum cryptographic systems need to be analyzed at a diploma of detail this is close pr ical implementation. Computer scientists have evolved various strategies and tools for the evaluation and verification of communication structures and protocols. Those especially applicable to safety evaluation are surveyed with the aid of Ryan et al. This technique has key capabilities. The first is the use of formal languages to precisely specify the conduct of the gadget and the houses which it is supposed to satisfy. The second is the usage of computerized software program equipment to both verify that a tool satisfies a specification or to find out flaws.
There are classical answers to insecure communication to all rely on making a few assumptions, approximately the computational power of a cheater, approximately the wide variety of cheaters, or something of this type. Based on quantum key distribution, one could in all likelihood wish that a quantum computer may permit us to weaken or remove these assumptions. For example, it is feasible to make a quantum digital signature that is comfortable towards all attacks allowed by means of way of quantum mechanics.
Along with advancement of information technology, it brought significant information security risk, leading to growth of cyber security and several crucial information hiding techniques. Information hiding technique is way of communication involving two or more parties who may not trust each other. For instance, while making payments to merchant through credit card to buy goods, third party should not be able to intercept your credit card number. Classification of information hiding techniques is shown in figure1.
Figure 1. Data Hiding classification (Minati Mishra, 2014)
Steganography is the science of hiding or encrypting a secret message within an innocent-looking message and transmitting the result so that the steganographic message is readable only by the intended receiver. The remark “Steganography” is originated from Greek word steganographia, steganos meaning “concealed” or “covered” and graphia meaning “writing” (Jian Wang, 2017). In the past, secret message was used to be concealed on any letter, painting or any other object in reliable and completely inconspicuous way. The Da Vinci Code, we all are familiar with is an example. However, new era of digital information processing has brought new breakthroughs in the field of steganography. Everyday people are using steganography to improve the safety of their messages or more specifically their personal data. Steganography can be further classified into mainly four types namely image, audio, video and text. The classification is made on the basis of cover medium.
Description of words that are going to be used commonly in the chapter
- 1.
Alice: wants to share secret information; the sender
- 2.
Bob: recipient of secret information; the receiver
- 3.
Eve: who wants to gain access to secret information unethically; the eavesdropper
- 4.
Cover Image: Images in which secret information is to be hidden
- 5.
Stego message: Obtained by combining secret information into cover image
- 6.
Secret Key: secret code shared between Alice and Bob
- 7.
Encrpytion(embedding process) and decryption(Extraction process):process to conceal secret message inside cover and recover it respectively.