A Plaintext Dependent Chaos based Image Encryption Scheme using Bit-Plane Scrambling and XOR based Diffusion
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.29304/jqcsm.2026.18.32908Keywords:
image encryption, Cryptography, Logistic Map, Plaintext-dependent Key, Bit-plane Decomposition, Zigzag Permutation, XOR Diffusion, Chaotic Sequence, Image SecurityAbstract
Secure image encryption algorithms received considerable development in cyber security applications in the age of digital data. This paper proposes a new hybrid image encryption scheme based on a chaotic system and bit-plane processing. The suggested algorithm uses a key generation mechanism based on plaintext, where the initial condition in a standard Logistic map is influenced by statistical features of the input image in addition to four external secret keys to increase key sensitivity and expand the size of the key space (2186). It is a two-stage encryption process consisting of a permutation and diffusion. The permutation process separated the input image into eight bit-planes and each plane is reordered according to a key-dependent scanning algorithm. During the diffusion phase, a feedback-based XOR operation is performed by using a chaotic key stream obtained from Logistic map such that adjacent pixels are strongly dependent. The experimental results show the proposed scheme presents favorable security performance of both color and gray image. The correlation coefficients of the encrypted images are low (≈ 0.0004–0.0044), and their entropy values are high (≈ 7.9970). In addition, the cryptographic algorithm is also very robust against differential attack such as Number of Pixel Change Rate (NPCR) = 99.63% and Unified Average Changing Intensity (UACI) = 33.39%. The results validate that the developed encryption scheme exhibits excellent confusion and diffusion characteristics, significant key sensitivity, and a high level of resistance to statistical and differential attacks, thus making it ideal for secure image transmission applications.
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Copyright (c) 2026 Zahraa Azhar Muhammad
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