Steganography

The same image viewed by white, blue, green, and red lights reveals different hidden numbers.

Steganography (/ˌstɛɡəˈnɒɡrəfi/ STEG-ə-NOG-rə-fee) is the practice of representing information within another message or physical object, in such a manner that the presence of the concealed information would not be evident to an unsuspecting person's examination. In computing/electronic contexts, a computer file, message, image, or video is concealed within another file, message, image, or video. The word steganography comes from Greek steganographia, which combines the words steganós (στεγανός), meaning "covered or concealed", and -graphia (γραφή) meaning "writing".[1]

The first recorded use of the term was in 1499 by Johannes Trithemius in his Steganographia, a treatise on cryptography and steganography, disguised as a book on magic. Generally, the hidden messages appear to be (or to be part of) something else: images, articles, shopping lists, or some other cover text. For example, the hidden message may be in invisible ink between the visible lines of a private letter. Some implementations of steganography that lack a formal shared secret are forms of security through obscurity, while key-dependent steganographic schemes try to adhere to Kerckhoffs's principle.[2]

The advantage of steganography over cryptography alone is that the intended secret message does not attract attention to itself as an object of scrutiny. Plainly visible encrypted messages, no matter how unbreakable they are, arouse interest and may in themselves be incriminating in countries in which encryption is illegal.[3] Whereas cryptography is the practice of protecting the contents of a message alone, steganography is concerned with concealing both the fact that a secret message is being sent and its contents.

Steganography includes the concealment of information within computer files. In digital steganography, electronic communications may include steganographic coding inside of a transport layer, such as a document file, image file, program, or protocol. Media files are ideal for steganographic transmission because of their large size. For example, a sender might start with an innocuous image file and adjust the color of every hundredth pixel to correspond to a letter in the alphabet. The change is so subtle that someone who is not specifically looking for it is unlikely to notice the change.

  1. ^ "Definition of STEGANOGRAPHY". Merriam-webster.com. Retrieved 14 December 2021.
  2. ^ Fridrich, Jessica; M. Goljan; D. Soukal (2004). Delp Iii, Edward J; Wong, Ping W (eds.). "Searching for the Stego Key" (PDF). Proc. SPIE, Electronic Imaging, Security, Steganography, and Watermarking of Multimedia Contents VI. Security, Steganography, and Watermarking of Multimedia Contents VI. 5306: 70–82. Bibcode:2004SPIE.5306...70F. doi:10.1117/12.521353. S2CID 6773772. Retrieved 23 January 2014.
  3. ^ Pahati, OJ (29 November 2001). "Confounding Carnivore: How to Protect Your Online Privacy". AlterNet. Archived from the original on 16 July 2007. Retrieved 2 September 2008.