Region-Based Transform-Domain Video Scrambling

In this paper, we address the problem of scrambling regions of interest in a video sequence. We target applications such as video surveillance preserving privacy, anonymous video communications, or TV news safeguarding the anonymity of a source. We propose an efficient solution based on transform-domain scrambling. More specifically, the sign of selected transform coefficients is flipped during encoding. We address the two cases of Motion JPEG 2000 and MPEG-4. Simulation results show that it can be successfully applied to conceal information in regions of interest in the scene while providing with a good level of security. Furthermore, the scrambling is flexible and allows adjusting the amount of distortion introduced. Finally, this is achieved with a small impact on coding performance and negligible computational complexity increase.