Data hiding scheme based on spread sequence addressing

Modern information technologies are constantly being evolved. On the one hand, this leads to the qualitative improvement in the services provided. On the other hand, this fact leads to the emergence of new threats to information security. In particular, new technologies for hiding data carry additional risks of computer security, for example, through the possible introduction of malicious computer programs. This article discusses the techniques for hiding data in cover images using direct spread spectrum. We propose a new technique that implies directly addressing to the propagation sequence. On the one hand, it significantly reduces cover file distortion. But on the other hand, the error rate in recovered messages does not increase. Our experiments have shown, that Spread Spectrum Steganography technique indeed reduce the distortion in cover images compared to other techniques. We give some illustrative examples and show the advantages of the proposed method. Even with a significant increase in encoding density, the quality of cover images does not degrade. We also conduct experiments and evaluate image quality based on Mean Squared Error (MSE) and Peak Signal-to-Noise Ratio (PSNR). The obtained results of experimental studies confirm the adequacy and reliability of the research results. The main disadvantage of the proposed data hiding technique is the high computational complexity. To recover messages, it is necessary to sequentially calculate the correlation coefficients with a large number of pseudo-random sequences.