A Comprehensive Study on Digital Watermarking for Security Threats and Research Directions

With the growing popularity of the Internet of Things (IoT) and the proliferation of AI-powered smart devices, a vast amount of digital data is being stored and shared on public platforms such as LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, and other social media websites. Among these, digital images are the most commonly used medium for data sharing. Recent reports indicate that Google Photos stores over a billion images per week. Additionally, digital images play a crucial role in various applications, including social media, smart healthcare, intelligent transportation systems, industrial automation, robotics, the film industry, legal systems, news and insurance industries, and business sectors. However, the misuse of these images raises significant concerns regarding privacy and security. Identity theft, a growing issue in the 21st century, is a primary contributor to fraud in India and other countries. Thus, ensuring the security of digital images is a critical challenge that needs to be addressed. Currently, watermarking algorithms offer the most cost-effective solution for securing digital images. Watermarking involves embedding hidden marks within digital content to enhance its security. The key benefits of watermarking include: 1. Reducing bandwidth and storage demands, 2. Preventing copyright infringement and ownership disputes, 3. Protecting against tampering, and 4. Serving as an authentication keyword. Watermarking has gained significant traction in various fields, including cybersecurity and e-governance; given the growing importance of digital watermarking from a security perspective, this study aims to provide a comprehensive analysis of watermarking techniques and their evaluation methods across different applications. The findings of this extensive study are presented in this paper. Social media and healthcare. The primary objective of watermarking research is to enhance robustness, watermark capacity, and invisibility—an intricate trade-off among these factors. However, many existing watermarking techniques lack adequate security measures. Various approaches are available for both implementing and evaluating digital watermarking algorithms.