The Journal of Supercomputing (2022) 78:222–237

https://doi.org/10.1007/s11227-021-03886-2

An optimized image watermarking algorithm based

on SVD and IWT

Ting Zhu1 · Wen Qu1 · Wenliang Cao2

Accepted: 11 May 2021 / Published online: 25 May 2021

© The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature
2021

Abstract
With the wide spread of image information, it is an urgent problem to protect image
property rights and crack down on piracy. Watermarking algorithm is an effective
means to solve the problem of copyright protection. In this paper, we propose an
optimized image watermarking algorithm based on singular value decomposition
(SVD) and integer wavelet transform (IWT). First, the carrier images are divided
into blocks. Then, the block-based integer wavelet transform is performed, and the
singular value decomposition is performed in the low frequency part. Finally, the
first singular value is used to extract energy effectively, so as to improve the robust-
ness of digital watermarking. At the same time, genetic algorithm is used to opti-
mize the robustness and imperceptibility of image watermarking. Four classic gray
images, including Lena, baboon, peppers, and Goldhill, are used as carrier images to
test, the test results show that the watermarking algorithm has good imperceptibil-
ity, and robustness. Compared with other methods, the experimental results show
that the algorithm has good PSNR(peak signal-to-noise ratio) and NC(normalized
correlation coefficient) values. In the attacks including Gaussian noise, low-pass fil-
tering, changing the size, straight square error equalization, image blur, image con-
trast, JPEG compression, and gamma correction, the proposed method shows good
performance. The NC value of this method is better than that of the contrast method,
especially in Gaussian noise attack.

Keywords  Singular value decomposition · Integer wavelet transform · Image

watermarking · Genetic algorithm

* Wen Qu
quwen2020@126.com
Extended author information available on the last page of the article

1Vol:.(1234567890)
3
An optimized image watermarking algorithm based on SVD and… 223

1 Introduction

With the rapid development of computer technology and the wide spread of net-
work information, the problem of digital copyright and property rights protection
has been widely concerned by industry and academia. The use of digital water-
marking technology to achieve digital copyright is the main means to achieve
property rights protection and combat piracy. In recent years, digital watermark-
ing has attracted the interest of a large number of researchers and becomes the
current research hotspot [1–3]. Digital steganography is an information security
mechanism that is general concerned with concealing the presence of a secret
data during mundane communication sessions by embedding the secret data in
another innocuous data in such a way that only the sender and intended recipient
are aware of the secret’s existence. In recent years,interest in steganography has
shifted from traditional and ancient practices into hiding secret data and media
objects, especially secret image files [4].
Digital watermarking is an effective way to protect information security,
achieve anti-counterfeiting traceability and copyright protection. It is also an
important branch and research direction in the field of information hiding tech-
nology. How to solve the contradiction among embedding capacity, invisibility,
and robustness of the algorithm has been a hot and difficult topic in this research.
According to the region of watermark embedding, watermarking algorithm is
mainly divided into spatial domain algorithm and transform domain algorithm.
The typical spatial domain algorithm the least significant bit method. LSB [5]
method is to use secret information bits to replace the unimportant part of the
original carrier, in order to achieve the purpose of secret information coding. The
algorithm has the advantage of large embedding capacity, but it lacks the ability
to resist geometric attacks. The transform domain algorithm is more and more
widely used because of its strong robustness. Among the main transform domain
methods currently used, wavelet transform has broad development prospects
because of its good time–frequency decomposition characteristics and compat-
ibility with the new generation of international compression standard JPEG2000
[6, 7].
The key problem of the current digital watermarking algorithm is how to
enhance the robustness of the watermark without affecting the imperceptibil-
ity of the watermark. At the same time, it solves how to embed multi-signature,
watermark, or label copyright owner. In recent years, singular value decomposi-
tion (SVD) can effectively extract the information of signal, the energy of the
extracted singular value has a decreasing trend, and it can extract the maximum
value of watermark energy [8–10]. In addition, the singular value has stability.
Therefore, the watermark algorithm based on singular value can achieve the pur-
pose of watermark robustness. Based on this, the current popular watermarking
algorithm usually adopts this algorithm to improve the robustness of the water-
mark. Many image watermarking algorithms based on singular value decomposi-
tion are proposed to solve the ownership problem. The key of image watermark-
ing based on singular value is the stability of singular value. Many authors have

13
 224 T. Zhu et al.

carried out experiments based on singular value decomposition or frequency

domain digital watermarking to achieve the purpose of robustness. For exam-
ple, in the literature [6], only singular value watermark is embedded in the car-
rier. But this algorithm will cause the problem of error detection. The problem
of error detection is that when a specific watermark is detected from the content,
but the embedded watermark is not the watermark, it will cause error detection.
Even if the attacker does not know the embedded original watermark, it is easy to
prove the copyright of the randomly embedded watermark. Many singular value
watermarks have serious error detection problems [11, 12]. Therefore, we need to
propose a new algorithm to solve the problem of error detection and improve the
imperceptibility and robustness of the algorithm [13–16].
This paper proposes a new watermarking algorithm. The main research idea and
contribution of the algorithm are focused on reliable, robust image watermarking
algorithm based on singular value decomposition and optimization. The proposed
watermarking algorithm combines the shaping discrete wavelet transform and the
enhanced genetic algorithm to optimize the image watermarking algorithm. Through
integer transform and singular value decomposition, the main part of the watermark
is embedded into the maximum energy step of the carrier image. Since the quan-
tization step size is the main parameter affecting the watermark performance, the
quantization step size is used as the optimization parameter. Therefore, a genetic
algorithm is proposed to optimize the quantization step size, instead of using the
popular fixed quantization step size. The selected heuristic genetic algorithm can
find the appropriate quantization step to balance the robustness and imperceptibility
of digital watermarking. The proposed image watermarking algorithm can also be
applied to image copyright protection and tamper recognition.

2 Preliminary

To understand the proposed method more easily, in this section, we introduce related
background knowledge.

2.1 Singular value decomposition

Singular value decomposition (SVD) is an important orthogonal matrix decom-

position method in linear algebra. The main reasons of SVD used in image pro-
cessing are: (1) SVD of image mainly describes the relationship between matrix
elements of image and reflects the intrinsic characteristics, rather than visual
characteristics. (2) In general image processing, SVD has good stability because
singular value is basically unchanged. (3) After DWT decomposition, SVD of
image has good stability, the low-frequency component image is like the origi-
nal image, and because the low-frequency component concentrates most of the
information of the original image, the coefficient amplitude has a strong stabil-
ity. Moreover, in the watermarking technology combined with wavelet transform,
the SVD of image matrix can concentrate the low-frequency information of the

13
An optimized image watermarking algorithm based on SVD and… 225

transform domain on a few singular values of the matrix and their corresponding
singular vectors. In image processing, we use formula(1) to decompose the image
of M × N. In the formula (1), a represents the matrix of the image, U and V repre-
sent the matrix of M × M and N × N, T represents transpose, S is the non-negative
diagonal matrix of M × N.

A = U × S × V T , A = {aij }M×N (1)

2.2 Integer wavelet transform

IWT (integer wavelet transform) can be attributed to a special implementation of

DWT (discrete wavelet transform). It is generally believed that the digital signal
with integer amplitude can also get integer transform result after wavelet transform.
At present, most of the watermarking algorithms are based on the traditional wave-
let transform, which has the disadvantages of high complexity and error caused by
floating-point rounding. Because the image watermark contains a lot of information,
and its pixel values are integers, integer wavelet transform can directly transform
the pixel values into integers, so there is no rounding error and can complete many
watermarking algorithms. Integer wavelet transform consists of the following three
steps.

(1) Separation: raw signal [Sk Separate into odd sequence [Ok And even sequence
j j−1

[Ek :
j−1

j−1 j j−1 j
[Ek = S2k , Ok = S2k+1 (2)

(2) Prediction: according to the correlation between data, odd series Ok By even
j−1

sequence Ek And the prediction results are obtained P(Ek ) And odd sequence
j−1 j−1

Ok The difference is regarded as high-frequency coefficients as the next level

j−1

of integer wavelet transform instead of the original odd sequence.

j−1 j−1 j−1
O� k = Ok − P(Ek ) (3)

 Among O� k represents the forecast difference, that is, the new prediction
j−1

sequence,P is a prediction algorithm. The prediction sequence must reflect the

relationship between the data.
(3) Update: to keep even sequences Ek The update operator U is used to calculate
j−1

and update the original even sequence.

j−1 j−1 j−1
E� k = Ek − U(Ok ) (4)

  E� k is the updated even sequence. After the integer wavelet transform, the
j−1

even sequence is taken as the low frequency part and the odd number sequence
as the high frequency part. The low frequency part can be further transformed
with the above separation, prediction, and update program.

13
 226 T. Zhu et al.

2.3 Genetic algorithm

Genetic algorithm [17] is proposed by imitating the process of biological evo-

lution. Genetic algorithm imitates the individuals in the biological community
by compiling chromosomes and emulates the reproduction and evolution of all
things in the biological community by selecting and cross-mutating chromo-
somes. Therefore, the final individuals obtained by genetic algorithm are basi-
cally excellent individuals in the population. On this basis, genetic algorithm is
widely used in the optimization of various algorithms. The algorithm framework
of genetic algorithm is as follows:

Step 1: Randomly generate an initial swarm.

Step 2: Select an evaluation function in advance and calculate the fitness value of
each individual in the swarm.
Step 3: Determine whether the iteration stop condition is met. If the algorithm stop
condition is met, otherwise continue to execute the program.
Step 4: According to a certain selection method, a certain number of individuals are
selected from the swarm and put into the matching pool.
Step 5: The next generation swarm was generated by crossing and mutating the
individuals in the matched pool.
Step 6: Go back to step 2.

3 Algorithm description

First, the carrier images are divided into blocks. Then, the block-based integer wave-
let transform is performed, and the singular value decomposition is performed in the
low frequency part. Finally, the first singular value is used to extract energy effec-
tively, so as to improve the robustness of digital watermarking. At the same time,
genetic algorithm is used to optimize the robustness and imperceptibility of image
watermarking.

3.1 Watermark embedding

In this paper, singular value decomposition (SVD) is applied to the carrier image,
and the watermark is embedded and extracted from the watermarked image. The
watermark is encrypted by encryption algorithm. The watermark is divided into
two parts. Only the first part is used to add watermark, the second part is used to
embed the key. The part of the embedded key is the reconstructed watermark. The
encrypted watermark can be transmitted over the network, and the key is kept by the
copyright owner. In this respect, the key method is used. It can be used for water-
mark authentication simply and quickly. Because the two parts are independent of
each other, even if the other part has changed, the watermark will not be exposed.
This watermarking system is robust after many attacks.

13
An optimized image watermarking algorithm based on SVD and… 227

Suppose that the watermark encryption algorithm has obvious gradient vector
and normal distribution. Different geometric image encryption algorithms are also
proposed in the literature. The special case of affine transformation in the literature
is used in this algorithm because of its universality and good encryption perfor-
mance. Suppose the size of the watermark image is N × N  , the encryption formula
of watermark image is as follows:
( � ) [( )( ) ( )]
X A B X E
Y�
=
C D Y
+
F
mod (N) (5)

A, B, C, D, E and F are encryption parameters. For a given positive integer n,

the necessary and sufficient condition for the periodicity of affine transformation is
{(X, Y)|1 ⩽ X, Y ⩽ N} . By using the periodicity of the transformation, the original
image can be reconstructed from the encrypted image.
After the watermark is encrypted, it is embedded into the carrier image through
the watermark algorithm. The flow chart of the watermark embedding algorithm is
shown in Fig. 1. The specific steps of watermark embedding algorithm is as follows:

Step 1: divide the carrier image into non-repetitive blocks.

Step 2: according to the size of the carrier image and the length of the watermark
image, the non-duplicate image blocks have different sizes.
Step 3: perform integer wavelet transform in each block. Integer wavelet transform
divides image signal into low frequency part and high frequency part. The low
frequency part has large energy, which can enhance and improve the robustness.
Therefore, our proposed image watermarking algorithm chooses low frequency
part to embed watermark.
Step 4: singular value decomposition is performed on each block of the low fre-
quency part of the above steps, and the singular values are obtained as follows:

Ai,j = Ui,j Si,j Vi,jT 1 ⩽ i ⩽ M, 1 ⩽ j ⩽ N (6)

  M and N in the formula (6) are the length and width of the watermark image,
respectively.
Step 5: after obtaining the maximum singular value of each block, the first singular
value of Si,j (1, 1) is quantized by the quantization step size, which can adaptively
adjust the watermark strength. A small quantization step can improve the imper-
ceptibility of the watermark, and a large quantization step can increase the robust-
ness of the watermark. Therefore, the quantization step can be used to weigh the

Carrier Block-based Adaptive image Reverse Watermarked

Image IWT SVD
watermark embedding SVD image watermark

Watermark Encrypted Watermark encryption

image Image Logo algorithm

Fig. 1  The watermark embedding process

13
 228 T. Zhu et al.

imperceptibility and robustness of the watermark. Because the first singular value
is very stable and has the maximum energy, the watermark can still be extracted
with small changes embedded in the watermark.
Step 6: make Di,j = Δ mod Si,j (1, 1) , wi,j is the watermark generated before. The
watermark algorithm is as follows:
 If wi,j = 0 , then
{
Si,j (1, 1) − Di,j + Δ∕4 Di,j ∈ [0, 3Δ∕4]
(7)
�
Si,j (1, 1) =
Si,j (1, 1) − Di,j + 5Δ∕4 Di,j ∈ [3Δ∕4, Δ]

 If wi,j = 1 , then

{
Si,j (1, 1) + Di,j − Δ∕4 Di,j ∈ [0, Δ∕4)
(8)
�
Si,j (1, 1) =
Si,j (1, 1) − Di,j + 3Δ∕4 Di,j ∈ [Δ∕4, Δ]

Step 7: inverse singular value decomposition is applied to the watermarked image

block.
Step 8: reverse integer wavelet transform completes the watermark embedding pro-
cess.

3.2 Watermark extraction

The process of watermark extraction is described in Fig.  2. Specifically, the

watermark extraction process has the following steps:

Step 1: divide the watermark into non-duplicate blocks.

Step 2: the integer wavelet transform is carried out in the non-repeated blocks, and
the different blocks are divided into low-frequency and high-frequency parts.
Step 3: decompose the low frequency part to get the first singular value of S∗ (1, 1)
i,j
from the obtained singular value.
Step 4: extract the watermark of w�i,j (1 ⩽ i ⩽ M, 1 ⩽ j ⩽ N) , the algorithm is as fol-
lows:

Watermarked Block-based Adaptive watermark Extracted

carrier image IWT SVD
extraction watermark image

Encryption Encrypted Watermark

algorithm watermark image

Fig. 2  The process of extracting watermark

13
An optimized image watermarking algorithm based on SVD and… 229

{
0 D�i,j ∈ [0, Δ∕2)
w�i,j = (9)
1 D�i,j ∈ [Δ∕2, Δ]

Step 5: decrypt the watermark with the same key of the embedded algorithm. After
decryption, the meaningful watermark image can be extracted.

3.3 Watermark optimization

In our proposed algorithm, the watermark optimization algorithm is based on heu-

ristic genetic algorithm [18, 19]. The basic principle and idea of heuristic genetic
algorithm are to use the principle of machine learning to take the requirement of
watermark system as an objective function, in which the optimization of objective
function is based on the parameters of watermark algorithm to achieve the objective
function optimization [20–24]. The performance of the proposed enhanced genetic
algorithm is better than that of the general genetic algorithm and has the advan-
tages that other algorithms do not have. For example, the objective function that
does not need to be optimized has continuous differentiability [25–27]. In addition,
the enhanced genetic algorithm has strong generality, implicit parallelism, and fast
convergence speed. When the number of learning samples is large, the convergence
accuracy is ideal. Genetic algorithm also has the ability of global optimization,
which can effectively improve the convergence speed and accuracy and improve the

Start

Randomly initialize

Yes Maximum
End
iterations?
No
Calculate the step size

Embed the watermark

Yes Calculate
The biggest attack
objective solution
No
Select optimal
Extract the watermark value

Calculate the Update genetic

normalized correlation value
coefficient

Fig. 3  The flowchart of watermark optimization

13
 230 T. Zhu et al.

performance of watermark optimization. Figure 3 is a flowchart of watermark opti-

mization. It can be seen that watermark optimization optimizes the parameters of
watermark embedding algorithm to achieve the purpose of optimal embedding.
The basic operation flow of the heuristic genetic algorithm used in this paper is
initialization, selection, cross-calculation, and update to complete the optimization
purpose. Specifically, the number of iterations is initialized first, and the popula-
tion is initialized. Then, the fitness of individuals in the population is calculated,
and each population is selected and updated by individual evaluation and objective
function. Based on the fitness evaluation of individuals in the population, selection
is mainly to pass on the optimized individuals or individuals produced by pairing
and crossing to the next generation. The purpose of selection is to directly inherit the
optimized individuals to the next generation or to produce new individuals through
pairing and crossover and then pass on to the next generation. After the selection,
the crossover algorithm is used to recombine the structure of the two parents to gen-
erate a new individual. Crossover algorithm is the core of heuristic genetic algo-
rithm. Update mutation is to update the individuals in the population in the mutation
algorithm, so as to change the population genes. One iteration includes selecting
crossover mutation and updating to get a new population. When the number of itera-
tions is maximum, the maximum fitness output of evolution process is obtained, and
the optimization of genetic algorithm is finished. Specifically, "Randomly initialize"
means initialization iterations and initialization population. It refers to searching the
most suitable initial parameters and embedding strength for the original images with
different features.
In the process of watermark optimization, the parameter of watermark optimiza-
tion is quantization step length. The purpose of watermark optimization is to bal-
ance the imperceptibility and robustness of watermark. The objective function to be
optimized can be defined as:
{ R }
1∑
(10)
�
Objective = max NCi (W, W ) + NC(S, Sw )
R i=1

NC is the normalized correlation coefficient, W and W ′ represent the watermark

and the watermark after attack, R represents the total number of attacks. Sw which
represents the carrier image and the carrier image with watermark. The goal of opti-
mization is to maximize the objective function.

4 Evaluation

In our experiment, the performance of watermark is measured by robustness and

imperceptibility. The imperceptibility of watermark is mainly measured by peak signal-
to-noise ratio (PSNR), and the robustness of watermark is mainly measured by nor-
malized correlation coefficient. Four gray images of Lena, baboon, pepper, and Gol-
dhill are used as carrier images, as shown in Fig. 4. The size of the carrier image is
512 × 512, the size of the watermark image is 32 × 32, and the execution time of the

13
An optimized image watermarking algorithm based on SVD and… 231

(a) Lena (b) Baboon

(c) Peppers (d) Goldhill

Fig. 4  Carrier images

whole algorithm is 5S. It can be seen that the execution time of the shaping algorithm
is very fast due to the use of integer wavelet transform. For the watermark capacity, due
to the limitation of watermark energy and noise energy at all pixel positions, the analy-
sis of watermark capacity mainly focuses on the change trend of watermark capacity
to meet the requirements of watermark, and some practical examples are considered.
The capacity of watermark is calculated by common algorithm, which is expressed as
follows:

1 P
C= log (1 + w ) (11)
2 2 Pn

13
 232 T. Zhu et al.

Pn is the energy of the carrier image. Pw is the energy of the watermark image.
By using formula 10, we get the watermark capacity value of 4, which can fully
meet the requirements of the watermark system.
PSNR is the abbreviation of peak signal-to-noise ratio, which is an objective
standard to evaluate image quality. The unit of PSNR is dB. The higher the PSNR is,
the smaller the distortion is.

4.1 Imperceptibility test

Imperceptibility is measured by subjective and objective image quality evaluation.

For the subjective test, the subjective test has dual stimulus continuous quality clas-
sification (DSCQS). This method is evaluated with an average rating score (MOS)
ranging from 1 (very poor) to 5 (very good). The average scores of MOS from 4 test
images obtained by 10 experts are listed in Table 1. As can be seen in Table 1, the
MOS results are very high. For objective evaluation methods, mean peak signal-to-
noise ratio and structure similarity (SSIM) are used to measure the imperceptibility.
Table 1 also lists the PSNR and SSIM values and the comparison results. As can be
seen from Table 1, the imperceptibility of the proposed watermarking system is very
good.
SSIM is used to measure the similarity of two images. SSIM uses two images,
one is an uncompressed image without distortion, and the other is a distorted image.
When two images are as like as two peas, the value of SSIM is equal to 1.

4.2 Robustness test

In order to detect the robustness of the proposed watermarking algorithm, a vari-

ety of attack experiments is carried out on the image with watermark. Such as: (a)
Gaussian noise; (b) low-pass filtering; (c) changing the size; (d) straight square error
equalization; (e) image blur; (f) image contrast; (g) JPEG compression; (h) gamma
correction. Table  2 and Fig.  5 show the PSNR results of four carrier images after
attack. Table 3 and Fig. 6 show the normalized correlation coefficient (NC) results
of four carrier images after attack. For the watermark extraction effect, we use nor-
malized correlation coefficient (NC) to evaluate, the bigger the number, the better
the effect. From the results, we can see that due to the superiority of our algorithm,
the proposed watermarking technology has a very high anti-attack ability after

Table 1  The test results of Attack PSNR SSIM MOS

imperceptibility
Lena 37.23 1 4.72
Baboon 38.12 1 4.81
Goldhill 37.56 1 4.68
Peppers 38.29 1 4..83

13
An optimized image watermarking algorithm based on SVD and… 233

Table 2  The test results of Attack Lena Baboon Goldhill Peppers

robustness of PSNR
(a) 36.25 38.01 36.48 38.22
(b) 26.32 27.43 26.89 27.58
(c) 31.29 32.55 32.02 33.14
(d) 29.57 30.21 30.25 30.87
(e) 22.48 23.54 22.97 24.65
(f) 19.23 20.35 19.84 21.23
(g) 35.17 36.39 35.68 37.10
(h) 18.99 20.11 19.62 21.12

Lena Baboon Goldhill Peppers

45
40
35
30
25
PSNR

20
15
10
5
0
a b c d e f g h
attack

Fig. 5  The test results of robustness of PSNR

Table 3  The test results of Attack Lena Baboon Goldhill Peppers

robustness of NC
(a) 0.9990 0.9997 0.9989 0.9995
(b) 0.9875 0.9921 0.9903 0.9920
(c) 0.9954 0.9968 0.9968 0.9962
(d) 0.9846 0.9894 0.9894 0.9879
(e) 0.9724 0.9810 0.9758 0.9768
(f) 0.9612 0.9747 0.9657 0.9725
(g) 0.9987 0.9991 0.9989 0.9991
(h) 0.9525 0.9612 0.9579 0.9657

13
 234 T. Zhu et al.

Lena Baboon Goldhill Peppers

1.01
1
0.99
0.98
0.97
NC

0.96
0.95
0.94
0.93
0.92
a b c d e f g h
attack

Fig. 6  The test results of robustness of NC

adding attacks, which proves that the watermark has excellent performance of high
robustness.

4.3 Comparison of algorithms

In addition to analyzing the key performance of imperceptibility and robustness of

watermarking, the proposed watermarking algorithm is also compared with the cur-
rent popular watermarking algorithms. We choose reference SVD algorithm [28]
and reference SVD-DCT algorithm [29] for comparison. These algorithms are fre-
quency domain watermarking algorithms, and all adopt singular value decomposi-
tion. Table  4 and Fig.  7 show the results of algorithm comparison of normalized
correlation coefficients after various attacks of (a) Gaussian noise; (b) low-pass fil-
tering; (c) changing the size; (d) straight square error equalization; (e) image blur;
(f) image contrast; (g) JPEG compression; (h) gamma correction. The ordinate in
Fig. 5 represents the value of the normalized correlation coefficient (NC). It can be
seen from the results that our results are better than these in references.

Table 4  The test results of Attack SVD SVD-DCT Ours

robustness of NC
(a) 0.9789 0.9956 0.9998
(b) 0.885 0.8968 0.9876
(c) 0.9825 0.9857 0.992
(d) 0.9667 0.9718 0.9896
(e) 0.9529 0.9762 0.9798
(f) 0.9446 0.9528 0.9786
(g) 0.9767 0.9879 0.9929
(h) 0.9516 0.9625 0.9758

13
An optimized image watermarking algorithm based on SVD and… 235

SVD SVD-DCT Ours

1.02
1
0.98
0.96
0.94
NC

0.92
0.9
0.88
0.86
0.84
0.82
a b c d e f g h
attack

Fig. 7  The comparison of algorithms

5 Conclusion

In this paper, we have proposed an optimized watermarking algorithm which is

based on singular value decomposition (SVD) and integer wavelet transform (IWT).
In this method, the carrier images are divided into blocks. Then, the block-based
integer wavelet transform is performed, and the singular value decomposition is per-
formed in the low frequency part. Finally, the first singular value is used to extract
energy effectively, so as to improve the robustness of digital watermarking. At the
same time, genetic algorithm is used to optimize the robustness and imperceptibility
of image watermarking. Experimental results show that the proposed watermarking
algorithm is not only imperceptible, but also robust against Gaussian noise, low-pass
filtering, changing size, squared error equalization, image blurring, image contrast,
JPEG compression, and gamma correction. The future research direction is mainly
to use machine learning and pattern recognition algorithm for performance optimi-
zation and to use other frequency domain transform and singular value decomposi-
tion to resist geometric interference attack.

Acknowledgements  The work of Wen Qu was supported by the Science and Technology Research Pro-
ject in Department of Education of JiangxiProvince under Grant GJJ191599.

References
1. Adams R, Bischof L (2002) Seeded region growing. IEEE Trans Pattern Anal Mach Intell 16(6):641–647
2. Xuan TP, Siarry P, Oulhadj H (2018) Integrating fuzzy entropy clustering with an improved PSO for MRI
brain image segmentation. Appl Soft Comput 65, S1568494618300097.
3. Niu Y, Chen J, Wenzhong G (2018) Meta-metric for saliency detection evaluation metrics based on appli-
cation preference. Multimed Tools Appl Online Public 77(20):26351–26369
4. Xu Y, Zhu C, Li C, Zhang Q, Meng X, Wang X (2018) Field crop segmentation based on color coefficient
reverse mutation particle swarm optimization algorithm. Trans Chinese Soc Agric Eng
5. Abdulla AA (2015) Exploiting similarities between secret and cover images for improved embedding effi-
ciency and security in digital steganography[D]. The University of Buckingham, United Kingdom

13
 236 T. Zhu et al.

6. Thakkar F, Srivastava VK (2021) An adaptive, secure and imperceptive image watermarking using swarm
intelligence, Arnold transform, SVD and DWT. Multimed Tools Appl 1–18
7. Priya C, Ramya C (2020) Robust and secure video watermarking based on cellular automata and singu-
lar value decomposition for copyright protection. Circ Syst Sign Process DOI:https://​doi.​org/​10.​1007/​
s00034-​020-​01585-6
8. Chen X, Li A, Xue’e Z, Wenzhong G, Gang H (2015) Runtime model based approach to IoT application
development. Front Comp Sci 9(4):540–553
9. Chakraborty R, Sushil R, Garg ML (2018) An improved pso-based multilevel image segmentation tech-
nique using minimum cross-entropy thresholding. Arab J Sci Eng (13), 1–16
10. Wenzhong G, Guolong C (2015) Human action recognition via multi-task learning base on spatial-
temporal feature. Inform Sci 320, 418–428
11. Wang S, Guo W (2017) Robust co-clustering via dual local learning and high-order matrix factoriza-
tion. Knowl-Based Syst 138:176–187
12. Dong G, Xie M (2005) Color clustering and learning for image segmentation based on neural networks.
IEEE Trans Neural Netw 16(4):925–936
13. Davis LS (1975) A survey of edge detection techniques. Comput Graph Image Process 4(3), 248–270
14. Ernawan F (2016) Robust image watermarking based on psychovisual threshold. J ICT Res Appl
10(3):228–242
15. Wang S, Wenzhong G (2017) Robust co-clustering via dual local learning and high-order matrix fac-
torization. Knowl-Based Syst 138:176–187
16. Samat NA, Salleh MNM (2017) A study of data imputation using fuzzy C-means with particle swarm
optimization
17. Liu G, Huang X, Wenzhong G, Yuzhen N, Guolong C (2015) Multilayer obstacle-avoiding X-archi-
tecture steiner minimal tree construction based on particle swarm optimization. IEEE Trans Cybern
45(5):989–1002
18. Jones G, Willett P, Glen RC, Leach AR, Taylor R (1997) Development and validation of agenetic algo-
rithm for flexible docking 267, 0–748
19. Kang LL et al (2019) Selecting hyper-parameters of gaussian process regression based on non-inertial
particle swarm optimization in internet of things. IEEE ACCESS 7:59504–59513
20. Kang LL, Chen RS, Cao WL et al (2020) Non-inertial opposition-based particle swarm optimization
and its theoretical analysis for deep learning applications. Appl Soft Comput 88: 106038
21. Kun G, Wenzhong G, Yuzhong C, Qirong Q, Qishan Z (2015) Community discovery by propagating
local and global information based on the MapReduce model. Inform Sci 323, 73–93
22. Lin B, Guo W, Xiong N et al (2016) A pretreatment workflow scheduling approach for big data applica-
tions in multicloud environments. IEEE Trans Netw Serv Manage 13(3):581–594
23. Mirghasemi S, Andreae P, Zhang M, Rayudu R (2017) Severely noisy image segmentation via wavelet
shrinkage using PSO and Fuzzy C-Means.Comput Intell
24. RahkarFarshi T, Demirci R, Feiziderakhshi MR (2018) Image clustering with optimization algorithms
and color space. Entropy 20(4), 296
25. Liu R, Tan T (2002) An SVD-based watermarking scheme for protecting rightful ownership. IEEE
Trans Multimedia 4(2):121–128
26. Niu YZ, Lin W, Ke X et  al (2017) (2017) Fitting-based optimization for image visual salient object
detection. IET Comput Vision 11(2):161–172
27. Pham TX, Siarry P, Oulhadj H (2017) Image clustering using improved particle swarm optimization
28. Ostu N (2007) A threshold selection method from gray-histogram. IEEE Trans Syst Man Cybern
9(1):62–66
29. Shnayderman A, Gusev A, Eskicioglu AM (2006) An SVD-based grayscale image quality measure for
local and global assessment. IEEE Trans Image Process 15: 422–429.

Publisher’s Note  Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published
maps and institutional affiliations.

13
An optimized image watermarking algorithm based on SVD and… 237

Authors and Affiliations

Ting Zhu1 · Wen Qu1 · Wenliang Cao2

Ting Zhu
zhuting2021@126.com
Wenliang Cao
Caowl22@163.com
1
College of Applied Science, Jiangxi University of Science and Technology, Ganzhou 341000,
Jiangxi, China
2
Department of Computer Engineering, Dongguan Polytechnic, Dongguan 523808, Guangdong,
China

13