Symmetric Encryption Framework for Reversible Data Hiding in the Encrypted Domain

Abstract

In the context of the deep integration of digitalization and cloud computing, the demands for privacy protection and value-added services for multimedia data have become increasingly prominent. Reversible Data Hiding in Encrypted Images (RDHEI) technology, which can embed secret data into an encrypted carrier and losslessly recover the original carrier, has emerged as a key research direction in information security. As the core underpinning of RDHEI, the diversity and performance differences of symmetric encryption frameworks directly determine the upper limit of the technology's practical application. However, existing research has largely focused on optimizing single frameworks, lacking a systematic review of their principles, strategies, and complementarity. Conducting such a comprehensive study is of significant value for technology selection and future breakthroughs. This paper focuses on symmetric encryption frameworks in RDHEI, systematically reviewing three typical categories from four perspectives: technical principles, encryption mechanisms, embedding strategies, and performance complementarity. These frameworks include full bit-plane partitioning with pixel prediction, those based on the Binary Symmetric Channel (BSC) and polar codes, and 3D model octree subdivision with multiple Most Significant Bit (MSB) prediction. The research herein not only provides a clear reference for RDHEI technology selection but also points towards the future direction of dynamic framework fusion, offering a new path to overcome bottlenecks in the information security domain by balancing capacity, complexity, and reversibility through modular design.