You can also install it using your default package manager. You can read the official documentation available here: Outguess is a widely used tool in BSD systems. It mainly supports files such as JPEG and NETpbm formats. The Outguess tool allows you to hide data in redundant bits of existing files. We can also use a tool to perform image steganography.
How to Hide Files in Images Using Outguess To view the files, unzip the image containing the hidden files. Once you have hidden the files, remove all other raw files to ensure security. Next, launch the terminal and navigate to the directory location where the zip and the image are.Īll you have to do now to hide the files is concatenate the zip and the image to an appropriately named image-you can call the image anything you want. Now move the compressed file and the image you wish to use to hide the files into the same directory. Next, compress the directory into zip format. Start by creating a directory and add all the files you wish to hide.
To do this, you will need to have a zip file containing all the files you wish to hide and an image. The first method we can use to hide files inside an image is the cat command in Linux. Having looked at what steganography is and its pros, let’s get rollin’ in the deep: How to Use the Cat Command to Hide Files in Images Once a file is hidden, it remains in that state until exposed.Steganography does not attract attention compared to other methods of encryption.Some of the other advantages of steganography include: For example, a malicious user is likely to ignore a secret document hidden inside an image of your cat than a file encrypted with GPG. Steganography is much more advantageous compared to encryption. Although steganography is an old way of hiding files and messages, it can be very useful when working in an unsecured environment. Steganography refers to the process of hiding a file, whether a video, image, audio, or text, inside another file. That said, disguising private files you want to secure is better than leaving them exposed.
NOTE: The methods discussed in this tutorial do not guarantee 100% security a security professional or forensics analyst can crack them. Provos is the author of the steganography program called OutGuess. For this tutorial, we will look at how to hide files in images as a bonus, we’ll also discuss how to hide files in audio files. The hidden data, if any, may have been encrypted before inserted into the signal or. This tutorial discusses how to protect and secure your files by hiding them inside other files. Given this, even if you do not share your computer with others, it’s essential to treat your security as a high priority and secure your files with cryptography and encryption methods. On these devices, we keep personal information and private files not intended for public access. – out.jpg – Output Image with Hidden dataĭata Retrieval : outguess -k "secretkey" -r out.jpg hidden.Today, we use personal computers as workstations and personal devices. – hidden.txt – Contains text or data to hide Outguess is one of the tool that allows the insertion of hidden information intoĭata Hiding : outguess -k "secretkey" -d hidden.txt image.jpg out.jpg Here is an example to insert data inside the image using Outguess tool: To view the original message we need that key or password.
Later, a quick obfuscation layer is added ( Password or key) to hide the visibility of the data in the HEX format. You can open and view that image normally.īut, to view the hidden content open that image in any Hex editor as mentioned above and see the hidden data at the end after the EOI marker. In Command prompt use the below command to hide the content.Ĭopy /b original.jpg + "hidden data.txt" "hidden image.jpg"Ī new image will be created with your data hidden.Take an image to which you need to hide.Create a test file with some data to hide.Here is an example to insert data straight inside the image without any tool on windows: – If any data is inserted straight in to an image you can see your data after the ” two bytes and ends with EOI (End Of Image) marker “ we can find it easily using the below technique,
It can be scattered all over the image or inserted straight inside. The flexibility of using images means that information can be hidden in a variety of ways. Steganography is an art of hiding a message, image, or file within another message, image, or file.