Improved Beta Chaotic Image Encryption for Multiple Secret Sharing

This paper proposes a new simple image encryption technique using the Beta chaotic map for performing the confusion and diffusion of input plain image. This image encryption is further applied to the multiple secret sharing (MSS). The former existing scheme in MSS employs the Chinese remainder theorem (CRT) and eXclusive-oR (XOR) operations to convert the secret image to become a set of shared images. The former scheme yields a good result while the number of secret images is even. However, it has slight limitation while the number of secret images is odd. This paper aims to overcome this problem by utilizing the proposed image encryption along with three new MSS approaches: 1) incorporating an additional random images; 2) performing k image encryption; and 3) using two different masking coefficients. As documented in the experimental section, the proposed method performs well in the MSS task. It solves the problem in former scheme on dealing with odd number of secret images. In addition, the proposed method is superior compared with the other competing schemes. The proposed image encryption also improves the security level in the MSS system.