Quantum image steganography is an important research direction in information security, and the current quantum steganography research is still insufficient in terms of security and embedding capacity. To address these problems, this paper proposes a least significant bit quantum steganography algorithm based on a hash table. The scheme first uses the hash table to store the location information of the information image. Due to the irreversibility of the hash table, it cannot be restored without the key, which greatly enhances the security of information transmission. In the embedding process, it is improved based on the traditional LSB, and the probability of modifying the pixel value is reduced by the design of “1.5 bit embedding 2 bit information” (i.e., 1 bit to store the information and 0.5 bit as the flag bit). For example, when the flag bit is 0, only the lowest bit needs to be modified; if the flag bit is 1, the extra information is hidden by the different-or operation, which improves the embedding capacity of information over the traditional LSB algorithm. Overall, the proposed scheme achieves an embedding capacity of 2 bits per pixel in the carrier image.In order to better describe the process of the new scheme, a quantum circuit is designed. The experimental results prove that the PSNR of the algorithm reaches more than 52 dB for the embedding experiments of different images while the time complexity is O(n); compared with the previous algorithms, the scheme achieves a significant improvement in the information embedding rate and security and has a good performance in imperceptibility.Extraction of the secret image requires three keys---<InlineEquation ID="IEq1"> <InlineMediaObject> <ImageObject Color="BlackWhite" FileRef="11128_2025_4818_Article_IEq1.gif" Format="GIF" Height="19" Rendition="HTML" Resolution="72" Type="Linedraw" Width="38" /> </InlineMediaObject> <EquationSource Format="TEX">$\vert K_1\rangle $</EquationSource> <EquationSource Format="MATHML"><math> <mrow> <mrow> <mo stretchy="false">|</mo> </mrow> <msub> <mi>K</mi> <mn>1</mn> </msub> <mrow> <mo stretchy="false">⟩</mo> </mrow> </mrow> </math></EquationSource> </InlineEquation> for the hash mapping and two auxiliary bitmaps <InlineEquation ID="IEq2"> <InlineMediaObject> <ImageObject Color="BlackWhite" FileRef="11128_2025_4818_Article_IEq2.gif" Format="GIF" Height="19" Rendition="HTML" Resolution="72" Type="Linedraw" Width="38" /> </InlineMediaObject> <EquationSource Format="TEX">$\vert K_2\rangle $</EquationSource> <EquationSource Format="MATHML"><math> <mrow> <mrow> <mo stretchy="false">|</mo> </mrow> <msub> <mi>K</mi> <mn>2</mn> </msub> <mrow> <mo stretchy="false">⟩</mo> </mrow> </mrow> </math></EquationSource> </InlineEquation>, <InlineEquation ID="IEq3"> <InlineMediaObject> <ImageObject Color="BlackWhite" FileRef="11128_2025_4818_Article_IEq3.gif" Format="GIF" Height="19" Rendition="HTML" Resolution="72" Type="Linedraw" Width="38" /> </InlineMediaObject> <EquationSource Format="TEX">$\vert K_3\rangle $</EquationSource> <EquationSource Format="MATHML"><math> <mrow> <mrow> <mo stretchy="false">|</mo> </mrow> <msub> <mi>K</mi> <mn>3</mn> </msub> <mrow> <mo stretchy="false">⟩</mo> </mrow> </mrow> </math></EquationSource> </InlineEquation>---whose combined size is <InlineEquation ID="IEq4"> <InlineMediaObject> <ImageObject Color="BlackWhite" FileRef="11128_2025_4818_Article_IEq4.gif" Format="GIF" Height="19" Rendition="HTML" Resolution="72" Type="Linedraw" Width="189" /> </InlineMediaObject> <EquationSource Format="TEX">$255(n + 1) + 2 \times (2^n \times 2^n)$</EquationSource> <EquationSource Format="MATHML"><math> <mrow> <mn>255</mn> <mrow> <mo stretchy="false">(</mo> <mi>n</mi> <mo>+</mo> <mn>1</mn> <mo stretchy="false">)</mo> </mrow> <mo>+</mo> <mn>2</mn> <mo>×</mo> <mrow> <mo stretchy="false">(</mo> <msup> <mn>2</mn> <mi>n</mi> </msup> <mo>×</mo> <msup> <mn>2</mn> <mi>n</mi> </msup> <mo stretchy="false">)</mo> </mrow> </mrow> </math></EquationSource> </InlineEquation> qubits.

A LSB quantum steganography algorithm based on hash encryption

期刊论文
发表日期：

2025年7月7日

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Hao-Ming Dang,
Hong-Mei Yang,
Dong-Huan Jiang,
Bin Yan,
Jia-Hao Huang,
Xiao-Tong Sun,
Xiang-Hao Yang

摘要

Quantum image steganography is an important research direction in information security, and the current quantum steganography research is still insufficient in terms of security and embedding capacity. To address these problems, this paper proposes a least significant bit quantum steganography algorithm based on a hash table. The scheme first uses the hash table to store the location information of the information image. Due to the irreversibility of the hash table, it cannot be restored without the key, which greatly enhances the security of information transmission. In the embedding process, it is improved based on the traditional LSB, and the probability of modifying the pixel value is reduced by the design of “1.5 bit embedding 2 bit information” (i.e., 1 bit to store the information and 0.5 bit as the flag bit). For example, when the flag bit is 0, only the lowest bit needs to be modified; if the flag bit is 1, the extra information is hidden by the different-or operation, which improves the embedding capacity of information over the traditional LSB algorithm. Overall, the proposed scheme achieves an embedding capacity of 2 bits per pixel in the carrier image.In order to better describe the process of the new scheme, a quantum circuit is designed. The experimental results prove that the PSNR of the algorithm reaches more than 52 dB for the embedding experiments of different images while the time complexity is O(n); compared with the previous algorithms, the scheme achieves a significant improvement in the information embedding rate and security and has a good performance in imperceptibility.Extraction of the secret image requires three keys--- $\vert K_1\rangle $ $| K_{1} ⟩$ for the hash mapping and two auxiliary bitmaps $\vert K_2\rangle $ $| K_{2} ⟩$ , $\vert K_3\rangle $ $| K_{3} ⟩$ ---whose combined size is $255(n + 1) + 2 \times (2^n \times 2^n)$ $255 (n + 1) + 2 \times (2^{n} \times 2^{n})$ qubits.