Open Access

ARTICLE

A Multi-Stream Scrambling and DNA Encoding Method Based Image Encryption

Nashat Salih Abdulkarim Alsandi¹, Dilovan Asaad Zebari^2,*, Adel Al-Zebari³, Falah Y. H. Ahmed⁴, Mazin Abed Mohammed⁵, Marwan Albahar⁶, Abdulaziz Ali Albahr^7,8

1 Information Technology, Duhok Private Technical Institute, Duhok, Iraq
2 Department of Computer Science, College of Science, Nawroz University, Duhok, 42001, Iraq
3 Department of Information Technology, Technical College of Informatics Akre, Duhok Polytechnic University, Duhok, Iraq
4 Faculty of Computing and Information Technology, Sohar University, Oman
5 College of Computer Science and Information Technology, University of Anbar, Anbar, 31001, Iraq
6 Department of Science, Umm Al Qura University, P.O. Box 715, Mecca, Saudi Arabia
7 College of Applied Medical Sciences, King Saud Bin Abdulaziz University for Health Sciences, Al Ahsa, 31982, Saudi Arabia
8 King Abdullah International Medical Research Center, Al-Ahsa, 36276, Saudi Arabia

* Corresponding Author: Dilovan Asaad Zebari. Email:

Computer Systems Science and Engineering 2023, 47(2), 1321-1347. https://doi.org/10.32604/csse.2023.038089

Received 27 November 2022; Accepted 02 February 2023; Issue published 28 July 2023

Abstract

Information security has emerged as a key problem in encryption because of the rapid evolution of the internet and networks. Thus, the progress of image encryption techniques is becoming an increasingly serious issue and considerable problem. Small space of the key, encryption-based low confidentiality, low key sensitivity, and easily exploitable existing image encryption techniques integrating chaotic system and DNA computing are purposing the main problems to propose a new encryption technique in this study. In our proposed scheme, a three-dimensional Chen’s map and a one-dimensional Logistic map are employed to construct a double-layer image encryption scheme. In the confusion stage, different scrambling operations related to the original plain image pixels are designed using Chen’s map. A stream pixel scrambling operation related to the plain image is constructed. Then, a block scrambling-based image encryption-related stream pixel scrambled image is designed. In the diffusion stage, two rounds of pixel diffusion are generated related to the confusing image for intra-image diffusion. Chen’s map, logistic map, and DNA computing are employed to construct diffusion operations. A reverse complementary rule is applied to obtain a new form of DNA. A Chen’s map is used to produce a pseudorandom DNA sequence, and then another DNA form is constructed from a reverse pseudorandom DNA sequence. Finally, the XOR operation is performed multiple times to obtain the encrypted image. According to the simulation of experiments and security analysis, this approach extends the key space, has great sensitivity, and is able to withstand various typical attacks. An adequate encryption effect is achieved by the proposed algorithm, which can simultaneously decrease the correlation between adjacent pixels by making it near zero, also the information entropy is increased. The number of pixels changing rate (NPCR) and the unified average change intensity (UACI) both are very near to optimal values.

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Keywords

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