RGB based dual key image steganography

This paper proposes a new approach of image steganography which increase the security of the secret data by hiding it at the random positions of the green and blue values of the image pixels using dual key approach. This approach performs some operation on the red value of the pixel of the carrier image using first key and based on result of this operation, secret data will be hidden at some random position of either green or blue value of that pixel, which is determined by the second key. This approach uses dual key (two keys) which will be generated again and again through the process of rekeying. Hiding secret data in RGB of LSB is not as secure as it is very predictable and if attacker knows the hiding process then he can easily extract the secret information from the carrier file. In our paper, secret information is hidden at the different positions of the green or blue values (which are determined by using the two keys), so it is very difficult for the attacker to attack and retrieve the secret information. We have used Peak Signal to Noise Ratio (PSNR) to determine the quality of the stego image. We have also compared PSNR values of this approach with PSNR values of other efficient approaches. The obtained result shows that this approach is very efficient and secure as compared to other image steganography approaches and it is also very simple to understand and implement.