A High-Capacity Reversible Data-Hiding Scheme for Medical Image Transmission Using Modified Elias Gamma Encoding

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

This paper presents the approach that uses a new lossless compression-based RDH scheme that creates vacant room for data hiding. The proposed scheme uses run-length encoding and a modified Elias gamma encoding scheme on higher-order bit-planes for lossless compression. The conventional Elias gamma encoding process is modified in the proposed method to embed some additional data bits during the encoding process itself. The revised approach ensures a high embedding rate and lossless recovery of medical images at the receiver side. The experimental study is conducted on both natural images and medical images. The experimental results show that the proposed scheme surpasses the well-known RDH schemes in terms of embedding rate without compromising the lossless image recovery. So generally the manuscript content is adequate for the publication. Reviewer belief that the selection of Electronic journal, special issue "Machine Learning: Practical Applications for Cybersecurity" is correct. Results are compared in points of secondary literature that increase the value of the paper.

Some recommendations to improve the paper:

-> please introduce the subsection to section 1 to highlight the location of the paragraph that discusses the contribution of this research.

-> in the abstract the main results should be presented in a quantified way. So please extend abstract

-> In this paper a lot of equations are given. I think it would be correct to add adequate references to them because not all of them are newly proposed by the authors.

-> for "Figure 8. Embedding rate obtained from natural image classes" and " Figure 9. Embedding rate from 100 medical images", "Figure 10. Entropy means" "Figure 12. Average execution time of the proposed scheme on various image classes" please delete the borderline.

-> One sentence with future research is not sufficient for this paper. Please extend.

Author Response

This paper presents the approach that uses a new lossless compression-based RDH scheme that creates vacant room for data hiding. The proposed scheme uses run-length encoding and a modified Elias gamma encoding scheme on higher-order bit-planes for lossless compression. The conventional Elias gamma encoding process is modified in the proposed method to embed some additional data bits during the encoding process itself. The revised approach ensures a high embedding rate and lossless recovery of medical images at the receiver side. The experimental study is conducted on both natural images and medical images. The experimental results show that the proposed scheme surpasses the well-known RDH schemes in terms of embedding rate without compromising the lossless image recovery. So generally the manuscript content is adequate for the publication. Reviewer belief that the selection of Electronic journal, special issue "Machine Learning: Practical Applications for Cybersecurity" is correct. Results are compared in points of secondary literature that increase the value of the paper.

 

Some recommendations to improve the paper:

 

Review 1: please introduce the subsection to section 1 to highlight the location of the paragraph that discusses the contribution of this research.

 

Reply 1: We thank the reviewer for this valuable comment. As per this comment, a new subsection (subsection 1.1) is introduced in the revised manuscript and the highlight of the proposed scheme is listed as bullet points to attract more readers.

 

Review 2: In the abstract the main results should be presented in a quantified way. So please extend abstract

Reply 2: The abstract is modified in the revised manuscript by introducing the key results that we have obtained from the proposed scheme.

 

Review 3: In this paper, a lot of equations are given. I think it would be correct to add adequate references to them because not all of them are newly proposed by the authors.

Reply 3: The equations that are not introduced by the authors are cited in the revised manuscript properly. We thank the reviewers for raising this point.

Review 4: for "Figure 8. Embedding rate obtained from natural image classes" and " Figure 9. Embedding rate from 100 medical images", "Figure 10. Entropy means" "Figure 12. Average execution time of the proposed scheme on various image classes" please delete the borderline.

Review 4: In the revised manuscript the borderlines of the graphs are removed as per this comment from the reviewer. 

 

Review 5: One sentence with future research is not sufficient for this paper. Please extend.

Reply 5: The conclusion of the revised manuscript is supported by the scope of future works in this domain. 

We thank all the constructive comments from Reviewer 1. We addressed all the comments from Reviewer 1 in the revised manuscript.

Reviewer 2 Report

The authors proposes an approach that uses a new lossless compression-based RDH scheme that creates vacant room for data hiding. The proposed scheme uses run-length encoding and a modified Elias gamma encoding scheme on higher-order bit-planes for lossless compression.My reviews and suggestions about their publications are listed;

1) The abstract should include the context or background information for your research; the general topic under study; the specific topic of your research; why is it important to address these questions; the significance or implications of your findings or arguments. It must also contain numeric values. Please highlight your contribution. Reorganize the abstract to conclude:
(a) The overall purpose of the study and the research problems you investigated.
(b) The basic design of the study.
(c) Major findings or trends found as a result of the study.
(d) A brief summary of your interpretations and conclusions.

2) The Introduction you should briefly summarize your methods and findings. Note that you may end this section with a sentence or two on the implications/novelty of your results. You mentioned the contributions in the introduction. However, you should rewrite this section and review whether what you wrote really contributes to the literature.

3) Add more reference to enhance literature survey section. Discuss the state-of-art techniques with their merits and issues. The literature should be developed. Discuss the research gaps and relate how the proposed work has improved them. You can discuss the following studies in your article.

·          Reed Solomon coding-based medical image data hiding method against salt and pepper noise

·          High embedding capacity data hiding technique based on EMSD and LSB substitution algorithms

·          Enhanced Lorenz-Chaotic Encryption Method for Partial Medical Image Encryption and Data Hiding in Big Data Healthcare

4) The System Implementation section should be explained in more detail.

5) What solution you propose to make the system more robust. What is your difference from similar studies?

6) In the security analysis section, RS analysis will contribute to the article.

7) Conclusion section should be extended. In other words, the author should discuss the future works related to proposed method and its drawbacks. Rewrite the conclusion with following comment:

(a) Highlight your analysis and reflect only the important points for the whole paper.

(b) Mention the implication in the last of this section. Please, carefully review the manuscript to resolve these issues.

(c) This section should be supported with numerical values.

Author Response

The authors propose an approach that uses a new lossless compression-based RDH scheme that creates vacant room for data hiding. The proposed scheme uses run-length encoding and a modified Elias gamma encoding scheme on higher-order bit-planes for lossless compression. My reviews and suggestions about their publications are listed;

 

Review 1: The abstract should include the context or background information for your research; the general topic under study; the specific topic of your research; why is it important to address these questions; the significance or implications of your findings or arguments. It must also contain numeric values. Please highlight your contribution. Reorganize the abstract to conclude:

(a) The overall purpose of the study and the research problems you investigated.

(b) The basic design of the study.

(c) Major findings or trends found as a result of the study.

(d) A brief summary of your interpretations and conclusions.

Reply 1: We thank the reviewers for a detailed comment to improve the abstract of the manuscript. Based on this comment, we gave an overview of the research problem that we addressed, the key idea behind the proposed scheme with a few quantitative measures observed during the experimental study with a brief analysis.

 

Review 2: The Introduction you should briefly summarize your methods and findings. Note that you may end this section with a sentence or two on the implications/novelty of your results. You mentioned the contributions in the introduction. However, you should rewrite this section and review whether what you wrote really contributes to the literature.

Reply 2: By considering the valuable suggestion from the reviewer, we added a sub-section at the end of the introduction section to highlight the novelty of the proposed scheme. 

 

Review 3:  Add more reference to enhance literature survey section. Discuss the state-of-art techniques with their merits and issues. The literature should be developed. Discuss the research gaps and relate how the proposed work has improved them. You can discuss the following studies in your article.

 

• Reed Solomon coding-based medical image data hiding method against salt and pepper noise
• High embedding capacity data hiding technique based on EMSD and LSB substitution algorithms
• Enhanced Lorenz-Chaotic Encryption Method for Partial Medical Image Encryption and Data Hiding in Big Data Healthcare

 

Reply 3: We thank the reviewers for suggesting relevant papers in this area that we missed during our review. We had a brief discussion on the above-mentioned papers in our revised manuscript.

Review 4: The System Implementation section should be explained in more detail.

Reply 4: The system implementation section is expanded with more details. Hope this will give better readability.

 

Review 5: What solution do you propose to make the system more robust? What is your difference from similar studies?

 

Reply 5: The system will work perfectly fine if there is no loss of information during the transmission of the final encrypted medical image embedded with clinical information. Multiple copies of patient details can be embedded in the same process to ensure the robust extraction of the hidden details. 

The proposed system is different from the existing RDH schemes in the following way:

• A new encoding mechanism is introduced by modifying the existing Elias Gamma encoding approach.
• The use of Run length encoding and modified Elias Gamma encoding scheme guarantees a high embedding rate.
• A few existing RDH schemes not ensuring the complete recovery of the original image. In the proposed scheme, the image recovery and data extraction process is guaranteed without any error. Note that the scheme assumes the data is transmitting through a lossless channel or we have proper error detection and correction scheme to restore the erroneous bits.

 

Review 6: In the security analysis section, RS analysis will contribute to the article.

Reply 6: In the proposed scheme, the final image is in the form of an encrypted image, hence we ignored the RS analysis. We have mentioned the reason in the revised manuscript based on the valuable comment from the reviewer.

Review 7:  Conclusion section should be extended. In other words, the author should discuss the future works related to proposed method and its drawbacks. Rewrite the conclusion with following comment:

(a) Highlight your analysis and reflect only the important points for the whole paper.

(b) Mention the implication in the last of this section. Please, carefully review the manuscript to resolve these issues.

(c) This section should be supported with numerical values.

Reply 7: The conclusion is revised by highlighting the important contribution with quantitive measures observed during experimental study.

Reviewer 3 Report

The authors proposed a reversible data hiding technique for medical images by using run-length encoding and a modified Elias gamma encoding on higher-order bit-planes of the input image. The authors analyzed the existing techniques in depth and observed their limitations. They have described their proposed technique by giving proper examples. The experimental results are given properly to compare with existing techniques. 

Only they need to check the language as some of the sentences need to be modified, for example in the sentence. "The amount of data required to handle is healthcare sector is exponentially increased due to the increase in the population" is used two times.

Author Response

The authors proposed a reversible data hiding technique for medical images by using run-length encoding and a modified Elias gamma encoding on higher-order bit-planes of the input image. The authors analyzed the existing techniques in depth and observed their limitations. They have described their proposed technique by giving proper examples. The experimental results are given properly to compare with existing techniques. 

Only they need to check the language as some of the sentences need to be modified, for example in the sentence. "The amount of data required to handle is healthcare sector is exponentially increased due to the increase in the population" is used two times.

Reply 1: We thank the reviewer for the positive feedback on the manuscript. By considering the valuable suggestions from the reviewer, we have done rigorous proofreading and corrected all the grammatical errors.

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Paper can be accepted in its present form.