# Design and Hardware Implementation of a Separable Image Steganographic Scheme Using Public-key Cryptosystem

**Authors:** Salah Harb, M. Omair Ahmad, M. N. S Swamy  
**arXiv:** [2006.02775](https://arxiv.org/abs/2006.02775)  
**Date:** 2020-06-04  
**Summary page:** https://www.summarizepaper.com/en/paper/2006.02775v1/

## Key points

- Salah Harb, M. Omair Ahmad, and M. N. S Swamy propose an efficient hardware implementation of a steganographic cryptosystem based on public-key cryptography.
- The proposed public-key cryptosystem offers a separable framework that allows for the independent embedding or extraction of secret data and encryption or decryption of the carrier using the public-private key pair.
- To encrypt and decrypt pixels of the digital image, they adopt the Paillier cryptographic system and design an efficient parallel Montgomery exponentiation core to perform underlying field operations in this cryptosystem.
- The hardware implementation results demonstrate efficiency in terms of area (resources), performance (speed), and power consumption.
- This small footprint makes it well-suited for embedded systems such as medical scanning devices, autopilot cars, and drones that require real-time processing engines to protect sensitive information during communication over unsecured channels.

## Summary

In their paper titled "Design and Hardware Implementation of a Separable Image Steganographic Scheme Using Public-key Cryptosystem," Salah Harb, M. Omair Ahmad, and M. N. S Swamy propose an efficient hardware implementation of a steganographic cryptosystem based on public-key cryptography. The authors utilize digital images as carriers of secret data between sender and receiver parties in the communication channel. The proposed public-key cryptosystem offers a separable framework that allows for the independent embedding or extraction of secret data and encryption or decryption of the carrier using the public-private key pair. To encrypt and decrypt pixels of the digital image, they adopt the Paillier cryptographic system and design an efficient parallel Montgomery exponentiation core to perform underlying field operations in this cryptosystem. The hardware implementation results demonstrate efficiency in terms of area (resources), performance (speed), and power consumption. This small footprint makes it well-suited for embedded systems such as medical scanning devices, autopilot cars, and drones that require real-time processing engines to protect sensitive information during communication over unsecured channels. This paper provides valuable insights into designing efficient hardware implementations for steganography-based security systems.