Open Access

ARTICLE

Reversible Watermarking Method with Low Distortion for the Secure Transmission of Medical Images

Rizwan Taj¹, Feng Tao^1,*, Shahzada Khurram², Ateeq Ur Rehman³, Syed Kamran Haider⁴, Akber Abid Gardezi⁵, Saima Kanwal¹

1 School of Computer and Communication, Lanzhou University of Technology, Lanzhou, China
2 Faculty of Computing, The Islamia University of Bahawalpur, Bahawalpur, Pakistan
3 Department of Electrical Engineering, Government College University, Lahore, Pakistan
4 College of Internet of Things Engineering, Hohai University, Changzhou, China
5 Department of Computer Science, COMSATS University Islamabad, Islamabad, Pakistan

* Corresponding Author: Feng Tao. Email:

Computer Modeling in Engineering & Sciences 2022, 130(3), 1309-1324. https://doi.org/10.32604/cmes.2022.017650

Received 27 May 2021; Accepted 14 September 2021; Issue published 30 December 2021

Abstract

In telemedicine, the realization of reversible watermarking through information security is an emerging research field. However, adding watermarks hinders the distribution of pixels in the cover image because it creates distortions (which lead to an increase in the detection probability). In this article, we introduce a reversible watermarking method that can transmit medical images with minimal distortion and high security. The proposed method selects two adjacent gray pixels whose least significant bit (LSB) is different from the relevant message bit and then calculates the distortion degree. We use the LSB pairing method to embed the secret matrix of patient record into the cover image and exchange pixel values. Experimental results show that the designed method is robust to different attacks and has a high PSNR (peak signal-to-noise ratio) value. The MRI image quality and imperceptibility are verified by embedding a secret matrix of up to 262,688 bits to achieve an average PSNR of 51.657 dB. In addition, the proposed algorithm is tested against the latest technology on standard images, and it is found that the average PSNR of our proposed reversible watermarking technology is higher (i.e., 51.71 dB). Numerical results show that the algorithm can be extended to normal images and medical images.

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Keywords

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