Document Type : Research Article

Authors

1 Department of Information Technology Engineering, Faculty of Computer Engineering, University of Isfahan

2 Department of Information Technology Engineering, Faculty of Computer Engineering, University of Isfahan, Isfahan, Iran

Abstract

Steganography is a solution for covert communication and blockchain is a p2p network for data transmission, so the benefits of blockchain can be used in steganography. In this paper, we discuss the advantages of blockchain in steganography, which include the ability to embed hidden data without manual change in the original data, as well as the readiness of the blockchain platform for data transmission and storage. By reviewing the previous four steganography schemes in blockchain, we have examined their drawback and shown that most of them are non-practical schemes for steganography in blockchain. We have proposed two algorithms for steganography in blockchain, the first one is a high-capacity algorithm for the key and the steganography algorithm exchange and switching, and the second one is a medium-capacity algorithm for embedding hidden data. The proposed method is a general method for steganography in each blockchain, and we investigate how it can be implemented in two most popular blockchains, Bitcoin and Ethereum. Experimental result shows the efficiency and practicality of proposed method in terms of execution time, latency and steganography fee. Finally, we have explained the challenges of steganography in blockchain from the steganographers' and steganalyzers' point of view.

Keywords

[1] Tayana Morkel, Jan HP Eloff, and Martin S Olivier. An overview of image steganography. In ISSA, volume 1, 2005.
[2] Eko Hari Rachmawanto, Christy Atika Sari, et al. Secure image steganography algorithm based on dct with otp encryption. Journal of Applied Intelligent System, 2(1):1–11, 2017.
[3] Said E El-Khamy, Noha O Korany, and Marwa H El-Sherif. A security enhanced robust audio steganography algorithm for image hiding using sample comparison in discrete wavelet transform domain and rsa encryption. Multimedia Tools and Applications, 76(22):24091–24106, 2017.
[4] Ramadhan J Mstafa and Khaled M Elleithy. A video steganography algorithm based on kanadelucas-tomasi tracking algorithm and error correcting codes. Multimedia Tools and Applications, 75(17):10311–10333, 2016.
[5] Satoshi Nakamoto. Bitcoin: A peer-to-peer electronic cash system. bitcoin. org. URL: https://bitcoin. org/bitcoin. pdf (accessed: 24.02.2020), 2008.
[6] Seyoung Huh, Sangrae Cho, and Soohyung Kim. Managing iot devices using blockchain platform. In 2017 19th international conference on advanced communication technology (ICACT), pages 464–467. IEEE, 2017.
[7] Asaph Azaria, Ariel Ekblaw, Thiago Vieira, and Andrew Lippman. Medrec: Using blockchain for medical data access and permission management. In 2016 2nd International Conference on Open and Big Data (OBD), pages 25–30. IEEE, 2016.
[8] Damiano Di Francesco Maesa, Paolo Mori, and Laura Ricci. Blockchain based access control. In IFIP international conference on distributed applications and interoperable systems, pages 206– 220. Springer, 2017.
[9] Lanxiang Chen, Wai-Kong Lee, Chin-Chen Chang, Kim-Kwang Raymond Choo, and Nan Zhang. Blockchain based searchable encryption for electronic health record sharing. Future Generation Computer Systems, 95:420–429, 2019.
[10] Yang Xu, Guojun Wang, Jidian Yang, Ju Ren, Yaoxue Zhang, and Cheng Zhang. Towards secure network computing services for lightweight clients using blockchain. Wireless Communications and Mobile Computing, 2018, 2018.
[11] Patrick McCorry, Siamak F Shahandashti, and Feng Hao. A smart contract for boardroom voting with maximum voter privacy. In International Conference on Financial Cryptography and Data Security, pages 357–375. Springer, 2017.
[12] Gavin Wood et al. Ethereum: A secure decentralised generalised transaction ledger. Ethereum project yellow paper, 151(2014):1–32, 2014.
[13] Huashan Chen, Marcus Pendleton, Laurent Njilla, and Shouhuai Xu. A survey on ethereum systems security: Vulnerabilities, attacks, and defenses. ACM Computing Surveys (CSUR), 53(3):1–43, 2020.
[14] Juha Partala. Provably secure covert communication on blockchain. Cryptography, 2(3):18, 2018.
[15] Mengtian Xu, Hanzhou Wu, Guorui Feng, Xinpeng Zhang, and Feng Ding. Broadcasting steganography in the blockchain. In International Workshop on Digital Watermarking, pages 256–267. Springer, 2019.
[16] Lejun Zhang, Zhijie Zhang, Weizheng Wang, Rasheed Waqas, Chunhui Zhao, Seokhoon Kim, and Huiling Chen. A covert communication method using special bitcoin addresses generated by vanitygen. Computers, Materials & Continua,
65(1):597–616, 2020.
[17] Mar Gimenez-Aguilar, Jose M De Fuentes, Lorena Gonz´alez-Manzano, and Carmen Camara. Zephyrus: An information hiding mechanism leveraging ethereum data fields. IEEE Access, 9:118553–118570, 2021.
[18] Arvind Narayanan, Andrew Miller, Steven Goldfeder Joseph Bonneau, and Edward Felten. Bitcoin and cryptocurrency technologies. 2021.
[19] Fabien AP Petitcolas, Ross J Anderson, and Markus G Kuhn. Information hiding-a survey. Proceedings of the IEEE, 87(7):1062–1078, 1999.
[20] BTC.com vebsite. https://btc.com, Desember 2020.
[21] EtherScan vebsite. https://etherscan.io/, February 2022.