Green Noise Diffusion Watermarking for Digital Artworks to Protect Copyrights and Originality Verification of Printed Materials

Abstract

We propose a green noise diffusion type digital watermarking method that embeds information that identifies a digital artwork (copyright information, database URL, etc.) into image data as a digital watermark, enabling copyright protection and originality verification of digital data and printed artworks. The embedded watermark has two types of green noise patterns with different coarseness. In the case of a copy, the finer watermark pattern disappears, making it possible to verify the originality. The green noise pattern is changed for each artwork, and a camouflage pattern is used, resulting in a secure digital watermark that protects against attacks such as removal or modification by third parties. We have confirmed the effectiveness of this method for digital artworks printed using Laxerop^TM technology based on electrophotography.