Type and Content

Information Hiding is an area of research investigating methods for embedding messages in cover data in such a way that the hidden data remains transparent for all users and it cannot be recognized by any dishonest adversary. Information hiding provides solutions to such basic problems of multimedia systems as protecting illegal copying of digital material, broadcast monitoring, document authentication, integrity proving, etc. To achieve this, information hiding systems insert into a digital material particular data, a kind of digital watermark. Some recent applications of data hiding even go beyond the framework by considering communications, such that the existence of a message is kept secret (in contradiction to cryptography, where this fact is known to all parties). The related research area is called steganography and its main aim is to construct systems for which the probability that any advisory can detect existence of hidden message is very small.

The aim of the seminar is to present theoretical as well as practical aspects of digital steganography and watermarking. We will discuss such topics as: theoretical models for information hiding, robust and secure watermarking methods, algorithms for steganography and stegoanalysis.

At the Institute of Theoretical Computer Science we currently work on a research project on information hiding. Some topics for study, resp. diploma theses concerning this subject will be proposed to the students actively participating in the seminar. The work can be done at the institute or at the BSI – Bundesamt für Sicherheit in der Informationstechnik, our cooperative partner.

Lecture