Correlation-based watermarking method for image authentication applications

Ira S. Moskowitz Naval Research Laboratory Center for High Assurance Computer Systems—5540 Washington, D.C. 20375 Abstract. We propose a correlation-based digital watermarking technique for robust image pattern authentication. We hide a phase-based signature of the image back into its Fourier magnitude spectrum in the embedding stage. The detector computes the Fourier transform of the watermarked image and extracts the embedded signature. Authentication performance is measured by a correlation test of the extracted signature and the signature computed from the watermarked image. The quality of the watermarked image is obtained from the peak signal-tonoise ratio metric. We also furnish simulation results to show the robustness of our approach to typical image processing as found in JPEG compression. © 2004 Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers. [DOI: 10.1117/1.1763589]