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An Analysis of Image Forgery Detection Techniques

Article in Statistics Optimization & Information Computing · May 2019

DOI: 10.19139/soic.v7i2.542

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 STATISTICS, OPTIMIZATION AND INFORMATION COMPUTING
Stat., Optim. Inf. Comput., Vol. 7, June 2019, pp 486–500.
Published online in International Academic Press (www.IAPress.org)

An Analysis of Image Forgery Detection Techniques

Chandandeep Kaur, Navdeep Kanwal ∗

Department of Computer Engineering, Punjabi University, India

Abstract Society is becoming increasingly dependent on the internet and so does it become more and more vulnerable to
harmful threats. These threats are becoming vigorous and continuously evolving. These threats distorts the authenticity of
data transmitted through the internet. As we all completely or partially rely upon this transmitted data, hence, its authenticity
needs to be preserved. Images have the potential of conveying much more information as compared to the textual content. We
pretty much believe everything that we see. In order to preserve/check the authenticity of images, image forgery detection
techniques are expanding its domain. Detection of forgeries in digital images is in great need in order to recover the peoples
trust in visual media. This paper is going to discuss different types of image forgery and blind methods for image forgery
detection. It provides the comparative tables of various types of techniques to detect image forgery. It also gives an overview
of different datasets used in various approaches of forgery detection.

Keywords Image Forgery, Forgery Detection, Fake Pictures, Blind Methods.

DOI: 10.19139/soic.v7i2.542

1. Introduction

Image Forgery is not a modern concept as it comes along with the invention of photography. But it comes in the
limelight nowadays, with the invent of easily accessible digital cameras supported with image editing software
tools. Image Forgery begins with the first known fake image that was of Hippolyta Bayard, who released a fake
picture of him committing suicide as an act of annoyance for the sake of losing the tag of inventor of photography
to Louis Daguerre in 1840 [1]. Digital visual media, nowadays, represent one of the prominent technique of
exchanging information, because of increase in easy to use and inexpensive devices. Moreover, visual media has
greater expressive potential than any of the existing media. It describes convoluted scenes in an uncomplicated
manner, whichever in a different way can be quite tough to transcribe. Malicious modification of digital images with
intent to deceive for the sake of altering the public perception is termed as Digital Image Forgery. The modification
is done in such a way that it hardly leaves any visually detectable traces. Manipulation of Digital images isnt
any longer defined to experts with all the arrival and dispersal of handy image editing tools and softwares. Some
of the well-known images editing tools available online are Sumopaint, Paintshop Pro, Photoshop CC, HitFilm
Express [2]. Manipulation of visual media with such easily available tools is no longer a herculean task [3]. It is
not concerned whether an image is fake or not, until or unless it causes some harm. These images are accepted
as certification of truthfulness almost by everyone and everywhere. So, confirmation of an images authenticity
is needed. Such confirmation is done with the help of image forgery detection techniques. These methods aim at
validating the authenticity of images. There are several types of image forgery exposed to date and correspondingly
the forgery detection techniques. This paper aims to review the existing types of forgeries and their detection
techniques.

∗ Correspondence to: Navdeep Kanwal (Email: navdeepkanwal@gmail.com). Department of Computer Engineering, Punjabi University,
NH64, Patiala, Punjab, India (147002).

ISSN 2310-5070 (online) ISSN 2311-004X (print)

c 2019 International Academic Press
Copyright ⃝
 C. KAUR AND N. KANWAL 487

2. Need of Digital Image Forgery Detection

In today s world, it has became so easy to access, process, store and share the information with the availability of
handy devices by everyone [2]. Image editing software tools are increasing day by day, leading to the forgery of
digital images.The rapid increase in forged images leads to decrease of trust in visual media. Easiness in simulating
origin and content of digital visual information, the trustworthiness has always been questioned. It raised the need
for forgery detection techniques due to the significant impact of image manipulation on medicine, justice, news
reporting and accounting professions [4]. Forgery detection techniques aim to identify inconsistent patterns which
are supposed to be present in the image because of manipulation is done in order to forge the image. Active and
Passive are the two approaches used for detecting forgery in images. The active approach requires prior information
about the image to be embedded into the image itself by using Digital Signature or Digital Watermark in order to
detect any manipulation [5], [7]. The passive approach requires no such information about the image to authenticate
it. It assumes the fact that although tampering wont leave any visual trace, but they are more likely to modify the
image statistics, and these underlying inconsistencies play key role in detection of tampering.
An example of digital image forgery is shown in Figure 1. In this image Malaysian politician Jeffrey Wong Su
En was seen being knighted by the Queen of England in July 2010. In Figure 1b the original image was, later on,
found out to be of Ross Brown, Formula One Managing Director of Motorsports,accepting the Order of the British
Empire from the Queen. Figure 1a later on, found out to be spliced, of Mr. Wongs face and an original ceremony
photo, to expand Mr. Wongs fame [6]. Another example of digital image forgery is shown in Figure 2. A leading
national party spokesperson shared an image on an Indian news channel which later on found out to be forged as
shown in Figure 2. The original image was an iconic image taken by photojournalist Joe Rosenthal in 1945 titled
Raising the flag at Iwo Jima taken during World War II as shown in Figure 2. Digital Image Forgery tends to alter
the public perception by representing such things which do not even exist. Forgery Detection Techniques aim to
verify the authentication of all such information so that it does not mislead the public. Nowadays, every country is
adopting the paperless workplaces which lead to storage of data virtually or in digital format, which makes it more
vulnerable to get manipulated. It raises the concern of data security. So, researchers took a keen interest in securing

(a) Forged Image (b) Original Image

Figure 1. Example of Digital Image Forgery

(a) Forged Image (b) Original Image

Figure 2. Another example of Digital Image Forgery

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488 AN ANALYSIS OF IMAGE FORGERY DETECTION TECHNIQUES

400

300

200

100

0
2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017

Figure 3. Year wise publications since 2007

the information by developing new forgery detection techniques, over the last decade [1]. For some recent years,
research manuscripts in image forensics published by the prominent publishers is shown in Figure 3 [8].

3. Image Forgery Types

The image may be forged either by adding, removing or replacing some regions in the original image with only
one thing in mind that it leaves no visually detectable trace. The image can be forged by using several methods,
these methods are commonly categorized as in Figure 4:

Figure 4. Types of Image Forgery

3.1. Copy Mover Forgery

Copy-Move Forgery involves duplication of part of a picture and then pasted into some other area in the same image
as shown in 5b. The intention is to shroud some of the information in the original image. It is the most usually
utilized methods to forge an image. As the copied part remains to be of the same image, no visible significant
changes are there. Therefore, its detection is usually tough [2] [9].

(a) Original Image (b) Forged Image (c) Image Retouching

Figure 5. Effect of Copy Move Forgery and Image Retouching

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 C. KAUR AND N. KANWAL 489

(a) First Image (b) Second Image (c) Forged Image

Figure 6. Image Splicing by using two different images

3.2. Image Forgery, using retouching

In this, the image does not fundamentally changes, but there is an enhancement, reduction of a certain feature of
the original image as shown in Figure 5c. It is a soft destructive image forgery. It is commonly used by magazine
photo editors in order to make photos more attractive. Such enhancement may be ethically wrong.

3.3. Image Forgery, using splicing

It is the composition of one or more images. The images are consolidated to make an altered image. It uses cut/copy
and paste operations. A bit of one image is taken and glued into some other image. It needs some post-processing
operations in order to completely merge the cut/copied portion of an image into another image as shown in Figure
6. The pasted portion disturbs the pattern of the image. Thus, analysis of image pattern helps in detection of image
forgery.

4. Passive Approach of Image Forgery Detection

Image Forgery is commonly done at pixel level because of its simplicity, which leads to the wide utilization of pixel-
based methods for detection of image forgery [4]. There are several approaches to pixel level Forgery Detection
which are classified as:

4.1. Copy-Move Forgery Detection Techniques

In copy-move forgery, different parts of an image are copied and moved to different locations in the same image.
Different parts of an image are strongly correlated in terms of their features. Abrupt features are computed either
by dividing an image into overlapping blocks or into disjoint blocks or by computing local key points for the
complete image. These features play a key role in copy-move forgery detection [10] [11]. Generalized structure
followed by every copy-move forgery detection technique is shown Figure 7 [12]. Operations such as cropping,
conversion of an RGB image to grayscale, DCT or DWT transformation are all managed by Preprocessing in order
to enhance the classification performance [3]. Feature Extraction and Feature Selection involves the extraction
of manipulation sensitive and most informative features out of a set of features of an image. Feature Matching
compares the selected features of every block to the other to find any similarity [13] . Forgery is localized by
highlighting the similar blocks in an image. Distinctive researchers make utilization of different types of features
[14]. These researchers are classified according to the type of feature used in their methods as shown in Figure 8.
Some of these methods are discussed as below:

4.1.1. Transform Domain Based Methods- In Transform domain, most information about an image is carried
by few coefficients. Instead of using all coefficients, we can use these few coefficients in our forgery detection
procedure. Copy-Move Forgery Detection in Transform domain is based on:
Frequency: These methods make use of frequency levels of an image. A method was proposed by [2] to detect

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490 AN ANALYSIS OF IMAGE FORGERY DETECTION TECHNIQUES

image forgery by utilizing Discrete Cosine Transform(DCT) coefficients. The work of [15] also make use of DCT
coefficients along with lexicographically sorting. Features are represented by the use of DCT on every single block,
then these features are lexicographically sorted to make the method more robust. In this proposed approach, DCT
coefficients effectively detect the counterfeited part even when the copied area is improved/modified to totally
blend it with background. It may recognizes the forgery even when the counterfeited image is saved using a
lossy compression technique, such as JPEG. Considering wavelets as a basis for forgery detection, [16], [17]
proposed approaches to detect forgery, by first exerting Discrete Wavelet Transform (DWT) to the input image
to produce a diminished dimensional representation. The compacted image is partitioned into intersecting blocks.
These blocks are then arranged and copied blocks are recognized utilizing Phase Correlation as comparability
criterion. This method takes less time. It provides a higher rate of accuracy. Dyadic wavelet transform (DyWT)
based approach was proposed by [18]. It is more suitable than discrete wavelet transform (DWT) due to its shift
invariant property. The image is decomposed into subbands. Sets of blocks are orchestrated in light of high likeness
utilizing the LL1 subband and high disparity utilizing the HH1 subband. Coordinated sets are recorded as copy-
moved. This technique turns out to be robust against rotation and JPEG compression. In another method [19] used
Fourier-Mellin Transform (FMT) in order to detect forgery in the image. These features are scale and translation
invariant. This method is vigorous to blurring, compression and commotion. But this method consumes a higher
amount of time. In order to detect copy-move forgery in the image [20] proposed an approach which uses Polar
Harmonic Transform (PHT) and Polar Cosine Transform (PCT). These features are rotation invariant which makes
this method computationally efficient.
Dimensionality Reduction: This method tries to reduce dimension feature vectors of an image which helps in
speeding up the feature matching process. Forgery is detected by using Principal Component Analysis (PCA) by
[21] in order to accelerate the procedure of forgery detection. These features are tough against commotion and
lossy compression, it makes the method computationally efficient. In extension to this technique [22] use Kernel-
PCA (KPCA) in its approach to give an accurate estimate of the rotation angle and scaling factor in altered blocks
whereas [23] use Singular Value Decomposition(SVD) in its approach which is useful in representing 2nd order
statistics. Forgery which manipulates higher order statistics is not detectable accurately by this approach.
Spectral Texture: Texture feature is calculated by using transform domain of the image. Gabor features are used
by [24] to detect copy-move forgery. This method is tough against JPEG compression. It also provides precise
estimation of tampered blocks, rotation angle and scaling factor.

4.1.2. Spatial Domain Methods- Spatial domain describes the content of an image by considering the location
of pixels in an image. In the spatial domain, pixels are highly correlated which makes computation larger. Forgery
detection in the spatial domain is based on: Key points: Key points are spatial locations or points in the image
that define what is interesting in the image. These are important because of the reason that no matter how image
changes, whether it rotates, shrink, expand or distorted, key points remain almost same in the modified image.
Keypoint based approaches [25], [26], [27], [28] and [29] makes use of Scale Invariant Feature Transform (SIFT)
in their approach, SIFT features are invariant to rotation and scaling. These are vigorous to commotion and changes
in brightening conditions. It has increased computational efficiency. But the problem with this approach is that it
detects false result also. [30] and [31] have proposed a programmed and strong copy-move forgery identification
technique in view of Speed Up Reduced Features (SURF), which distinguishes duplication region with various
sizes. It identifies copy-move imitation with a minimum false counterpart for pictures with high resolution. These
features are strong to added commotion and obscuring. These are invariant to rotation and scaling. [32] use Mirror

Tempered
Image Pre-processing Feature Extraction Feature Selection

Locate Tempered Regions Verification Feature Matching

Figure 7. Generalized structure of copy move forgery detection

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 C. KAUR AND N. KANWAL 491

Blur Liu et al. (2011)

Babak Mahdian & Stanislav Saic

Moment Hu
(2007)

Zernike Ryu et al. (2010)

D.G. Lowe (1999), Huang et al.

SIFT (2008), Amerini et al. (2011), Xunyu
Pan & Siwei Lyu (2010)

B.L. Shivakumar & S. Santhosh

Keypoints SURF
Baboo (2011), Xu et al. (2010)

MIFT Jaberi et al. (2014)

Li et al. (2013), Ardizzone et al.

Special Texture LBP
(2010)
Copy Move Forgery Detection

Fridrich et al. (2003), Huang et al.

DCT
(2011)

Saiqa Khan & Arun Kulkarni (2010),

DWT Bashar et al.(2007), Muhammad et al.
(2012)
Frequency

FMT Bayram (2009)

PCT Yuenan Li (2013)

Xiao Bing Kang & Shengmin Wei

SVD (2008), Zhang Ting & Wang Rang-
Ding (2009)

Dimensionality Reduction PCA Alin C Popescu & Hang Farid (2004)

KPCA Bashar et al. (2010)

Hao Chiang Hsu & Min Shi Wang

Spectral Texture Gabor Filter
(2012)

Figure 8. Image Forgery Detection Techniques

Reflection Invariant Feature Transform (MIFT) in its research. MIFT features are helpful in robustly localizing
forgery among all available SIFT methods. These are invariant to rotation and scaling. They are invariant to mirror

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492 AN ANALYSIS OF IMAGE FORGERY DETECTION TECHNIQUES

reflection transformations too. This technique can identify copied areas with higher precision, particularly when
the measure of the copied portion is little.
Moments: Moments are a sure specific weighted average of the picture pixels Intensities. The Function of such
moments is utilized to get an understanding of a picture in [33]. It make utilization of initial four Hu moments
of the circle blocks in order to distinguish and find the copied areas with rotation. While most techniques fall
flat when the duplicated region is rotated before being glued, however, this strategy is powerful not exclusively
to clamor defilement, obscuring, and JPEG compression yet additionally to the rotation. The proposed technique
has better time execution when contrasted with existing strategies on account of the lower feature dimension.
[34] proposes a scientific strategy to restrict copied picture regions in view of Zernike moments of small picture
blocks. It exploits rotation invariance properties which help in recognizing copied regions regardless of whether the
copied area gets pivoted before sticking. It has high strength against JPEG compression, obscuring, added white
Gaussian commotion, and moderate scaling. For blur moment invariants [35] proposed a strategy which permits
effective identification of copy-move fraud, notwithstanding when copied regions have obscure debasement, extra
commotion, or haphazard contrast changes are available in it. This strategy functions admirably for a lossy
arrangement, for example, JPEG.
Intensity: Intensity levels of red, green, blue channel of an image are considered in this method [36] which make
use of intensity values in its approach. This approach shows that methods in which intensity values are considered
as features are robust and can successfully detect copy-move forgery in pictures that have been subjected to different
types of post area duplication picture processing like obscuring, clamor sullying, extreme lossy compression, and
a blend of these activities. This strategy has bring down computational complexity and is more powerful against
stronger attacks.
Spatial Texture: It is the spatial arrangement of color or intensities in an image or a selected region of an image
[37]. Image binarization [38] can be used to segmenting foreground of image from background whereas binary
pattern classification in local level may help in finding the forgery. [39] utilizes Local Binary Pattern (LBP) as
features with a specific end goal to identify imitation. LBP is a sort of gray scale texture operator which is utilized
for portraying the spatial structure of the picture texture. This strategy turns out to be vigorous against JPEG
compression, rotation, obscuring and commotion sullying.

4.1.3. Hybrid Methods Different features have their own pros and cons. Two or more features are combined in
order to make a robust technique. Various features are combined by [40], [41] to detect forgery accurately and more
precisely and with minimum false positives. Table 1 summarize various techniques of copy move forgery detection
techniques.

Table 1. Comparative Table of Copy-Move Forgery Detection Techniques

S.No. Paper Publication Method Used Merits/Demerits

Year

Efficient and reliable

1 Fridrich et al. [2] 2003 DCT
Doesnt work for noisy images
It detects forgery even when significant amounts
2 A.C. Popescu & H. 2004 PCA
of corrupting noise are present
Farid [21]

3 W. Luo & J. Huang 2006 Intensity levels Have lower computational complexity
[36]

Robustness for post processing operations

4 B. Mahdian & S. 2007 Blur Moment
Works well for both lossy and lossless formats
Saic [35] Invariant

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 C. KAUR AND N. KANWAL 493

Robust against blurring, added noise and change

in contrast.
5 Li et al. [40] 2007 DWT + SVD Low computational complexity
Accurately localize the highly compressed or edge
processed duplicated regions

6 Bashar et al. [17] 2007 DWT Efficient and robust approach

Robust against compound image processing

7 Hailing et al. [26] 2008 SIFT
Not robust against small tampered region
Time efficient
8 Bayram [19] 2009 FMT Robust against lossy compression, scaling and
rotation
Lower computational complexity
9 Z. Ting & W. Rang- 2009 SVD
Does not work well for lossy compression
Ding [23]

10 X. Pan & S. Lyu [29] 2010 SIFT Robust against noise

Good detection rate for refined forgeries

11 Pan et al. [28] 2010 SIFT
Smaller replicated regions are difficult to detect
Fast method
12 Xu et al. [31] 2010 SURF Robust against additive noise, blurring and
rotation
High accuracy
13 S. Khan & A. Kulka- 2010 DWT
Require less time
rni [16]
Reduces false detection
Works well in noisy and compressed image
14 Bashar et al. [22] 2010 KPCA+DWT
Cannot handle scaling and shearing geometric
operation
Precisely localize tampered area
15 Amerini et al. [27] 2011 SIFT
Detect multiple cloning Reliable
Have minimum false matches for high resolution
16 B. L. Shivakumar & 2011 SURF + KD- images
S. S. Baboo [30] Tree Cannot detect small copied regions
Performance efficient It discards the Hu moments
17 Liu et al. [33] 2011 Hu moments outside the inscribed circle which affect false
forgery detection
Lesser number of features to represent a block
18 Huang et al. [15] 2011 DCT causing better effectiveness
Robust against JPEG compression, blurring,
AWGN distortion
Does not detect forgery accurately for rotated or
19 Ghorbani et al. [41] 2011 DWT +
scaled copied region
DCT(QCD)

Perform well in fixed or variable size images, to

20 Muhammad et al. 2012 DyWT
detect forgery with or without rotation
[18]
Reliable and robust
21 H.C. Hsu & M.S. 2012 Gabor descriptor Have higher accuracy rate, estimated rotation
Wang [24] angle and scaling factor
Robust against blurring, additive white Gaussian
noise, JPEG compression, and moderate scaling
22 Ryu et al. [34] 2013 Zernike
can not localize tampered regions that underwent
Moments
affine transformations except rotation.
Robust against region rotation, flipping, blurring,
JPEG compression
23 Li et al. [39] 2013 LBP + PHT
Cannot detect forgery when a duplicated region is
rotated at general angles.

24 Y. Li [20] 2013 PCT High accuracy

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494 AN ANALYSIS OF IMAGE FORGERY DETECTION TECHNIQUES

The accuracy rate is high

Detect forgery in the small size tampered region
25 Jaberi et al. [32] 2014 MIFT
Does not work well for flat surface duplicated
regions
The proposed method can withstand postprocess-
ing operations like blurring, noise addition and
26 Thampi et al. [42] 2016 Segmentation
also geometric transformations such as rotation,
scaling, JPEG compression etc.
It can precisely detect the tampered regions,
even if the pasted region has undergone several
27 Fan Yang et al. [43] 2017 KAZE + SIFT
transformations such as rotation, scaling, JPEG
compression.
This method reduces forgery detection time.
28 Bhanu et al. [44] 2017 Segmentation
It gives reduced false positive rate.
+ SURF +
Knn (K-nearest
neighbor)
This method is robust when compared with the
29 Emam et al. [45] 2017 Difference state-of-the-art methods.
of Gaussians It can detect forgery even from smooth regions.
(DOG) operator
+ Multi-supportt
region order-
based gradient
histogram
(MROGH)
descriptor
It can precisely locate the tampered regions,
30 Chou et al. [46] 2018 Local Gabor even if the forged image is distorted by JPEG
wavelets compression, blurring, rotation etc.
patterns
(LGWP)
+ Gabor +
Filter+Local
binary pattern
(LBP)

4.2. Image Splicing Detection Techniques

Image Splicing Detection Methods aims at finding splicing sensitive features and any disturbance in image patterns
which are present in the image because of cut and pasted regions. Every detection method follows a generalized
structure as shown in Figure 9. In this generalized structure, Preprocessing manages activities, for example, editing,
changing the RGB picture into grayscale, DCT or DWT change to enhance the categorization performance [3].
Feature Extraction and Feature Selection involves the extraction of most informative features out of a set of features
of an image. Classifier in this model are trained to distinguish whether a picture is legitimate or interfered, with the
assistance of extracted features of various images of different datasets available. [47] examines the image run-length
portrayal and sharp image attributes as a discontinuity in image pixel correlation and coherency which is triggered
by splicing. Image Run length portrayal and image edge statistics like features are utilized to recognize splicing
in it. Another paper [48] calculates the approximate run length along edge gradient direction utilizing computed
edge gradient matrix. A few features are extracted from surmised Run length histogram. To get more features,
Approximate run length is applied to anticipate error images and this remade image in view of DWT is utilized as a
part of image splicing detection. Further, [49] expanded this idea by the original Markov features given by [50], to
capture intra-block as well as the inter-block correlation between BDCT coefficients. More features are extricated
in DWT space to describe positions, scales, orientations dependency among wavelet coefficients. Then, SVM-RFE
is utilized to lessen the features. After then, SVM distinguishes the original and spliced image. [51] proposes a
strategy where Markov features in spatial and Discrete Cosine Transform Domains are extricated and consolidated
to detect forgery. Principal Component Analysis (PCA) chooses the most pertinent features. With the assistance of
the radial basis function kernel, an enhanced SVM is built to distinguish forged and legitimate images. This method

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 C. KAUR AND N. KANWAL 495

Training Phase

Training
Image Pre-processing Feature Extraction Feature Selection

Labels
Training

Testing Phase

Testing
Image Pre-processing Feature Extraction Feature Selection Prediction

Post- Processing

Figure 9. Generalized model of image splicing forgery detection

provides higher accuracy with the minimum use of feature dimension. Local Binary Pattern (LBP) based approach
is proposed in [52], which firstly divides the chrominance component of the input image into intersecting blocks.
LBP is calculated for each block and afterward each blocks LBP is changed into frequency domain utilizing 2D
DCT. Standard deviations of separate frequency coefficient of each block are computed and utilized as features.
[53] handles high dimensionality and repetition in extricated features effectively. It proposes a strategy to enhance
Run Length Run Number (RLRN) algorithm by applying PCA and KPCA dimension diminishment technique to
decrease computational time. Afterwards, SVM characterizes the bonafide and altered pictures.
DCT coefficients are used by [27] as first digit features to distinguish and confine a solitary and a twofold JPEG
compression in small segments of a picture. It defeats the constraint of proving multi-JPEG compression in a full-
frame picture. SVM is utilized to classify the picture in this technique. Another splicing approach [54] recognizes
image splicing based on an irregularity in the obscure degree and profundity data of a picture. Subsequent to
evaluating the local obscure kernels of picture blocks, the multistep re-obscuring procedure is utilized to quantify
relative obscure degrees of assessed local obscure kernels. These relative obscure degrees are utilized to classify
the picture block. Any irregularity in obscure degree is utilized as a confirmation of picture splicing. [55] proposes
a method which extracts two groups of features from first-order histogram of DWT coefficients of the image and
Hilbert Huang Transform (HHT) of the image. These extracted features are fed to SVM to help it in classifying
real and spliced image. A comparison of different methods of image splicing is presented in Table 2

4.3. Image Retouching Detection Techniques

Image Retouching Detection methods aim to detect inpainting forgery. It is a forgery type where copied information
is non-continuous.
[56] rated the photographs on a metric (1-5) by estimating geometric and photometric changes done to an image
with the help of digital photo-editing techniques. Minimum metric value represents the least retouching done to
an image and maximum value represent a huge amount of retouching. Geometric changes were calculated with
4 measurements: mean and standard deviation of motion magnitude which is figured independently for body and
face of the object and Photometric changes were estimated using 4 measurements: mean and standard deviation
of spatial limits of sharpening/smoothing filters and Structural Similarity Index Metric (SSIM). A three step
method is proposed in [57] where inpainting detection is done. It makes use of patches and three global parameter
thresholds. In the first step, it looks out for all pairs of similar patches using similarity measure, distance measure
and cardinality measure. In the second step, tampering mask is generated with localization of matched patches. In
order to reduce false detected patches, it makes use of filtering scheme in the third step. The human judgment of

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496 AN ANALYSIS OF IMAGE FORGERY DETECTION TECHNIQUES

Table 2. Comparative Table of Image Splicing Forgery Detection Techniques

S. No. Paper Title Publication Features Classifier Dataset Feature Accuracy

Year Extracted Used Used Dimension Rate as
claimed
(%)
1 Dong et al. [47] 2009 Run length SVM CISDE 61 76.52
and Image
edge
statistics
2 Zhang et al. [23] 2009 Markov & SVM CISDE 109 91.5
CCPM of DCT
3 Li et al. [55] 2010 HHT & DWT SVM CISDE 72 85.87
coefficient
histograms
4 He et al. [48] 2011 Approximate SVM CISDE 30 80.58
Run
Length(ARL)
5 He et al. [49] 2012 BDCT SVM + RFE CISDE 100 93.55
Markov & CASIA Y-100 89.76
DWT Markov v2.0
6 A. A. Alahmadi 2013 LBP & DCT SVM CASIA - 97
et. al [52] v1.0 - 97.5
CASIA
v2.0
7 Moghaddasi [53] 2014 RLRN & SVM CISDE 50 88.28
PCA/KPCA CASIA Y-50 88.28
v1.0 Cb-50 89.36
Cr-50 88.31
8 El-Alfy et. al [51] 2015 BDCT SVM + PCA CISDE 50 98.22
Markov &
Spatial

beauty utilizing different features like localization of face, eye, pupil, eyebrows, thebase of the nose, lip, chin is
measured in [58]. Several impermanent features like make-up, haircut, presence of glasses likewise influence the
human judgment of beauty is proved by [59]. A novel dataset SCUT-FBP [65] is proposed which contains pictures
of 500 Asian female alongside appeal appraisals, for facial beauty perception. This rating is performed with various
blends of facial geometrical features and texture features utilizing machine learning and deep learning techniques.
An efficient forgery detection algorithm [60], which integrated central pixel Mapping (CPM) a speed-up method
for finding suspicious blocks with similar hash-values, greatest zero connectivity component labeling (GZCL)
marks the tampered pixels in suspected block pairs and fragment splicing detection (FSD)which denotes the altered
pixels in presumed block pairs and fragment splicing detection (FSD) which recognizes and locates the altered
regions from its best match areas to detect image altering. Chang et al. [61] proposed a strategy which distinguishes
the forged regions, even for images having a uniform background. This technique contains two procedures. A
suspicious area location process which looks through the similitude blocks to discover suspicious regions, it utilizes
comparability vector to decrease false positives. Forged region identification process which makes utilization of
multi-region realtion (MRR) to distinguish tampered areas.

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Table 3. Description of the various MICC copy-move forgery datasets

Dataset Total No. No. of No. of Image Image Image

of images authentic tampered type format resolution
images images
MICC- 2000 1300 700 Color JPEG 2048*1536
F2000[27]
MICC-F220 [27] 220 110 110 Color JPEG 722*480,
800*600
MICC- 600 440 160 Color PNG 3264*2448
F600 [27]

5. Datasets available for Image Forgery Detection

To evaluate the performance and validate the results of different forgery detection methods, benchmarked image
forgery datasets are required. There are a few freely accessible datasets for copy-move forgery, image splicing
forgery and image retouching forgery available. A concise description of accessible datasets is given beneath:

5.1. Copy-move forgery datasets

MICC-F2000, MICC-F220, MICC-F600 AND CoMoFoD are available data sets to evaluate the performance of
copy-move forgery detection algorithm. The altered pictures in these datasets are made by replicating small patches
of the image and moving these patches onto some other location in the same image. Diverse post-processing
activities (e.g., Rotation, Scaling, Translation or their blend) have been performed on these small patches in order
to merge them completely in the image. The underlying facts behind the copy-move forgery is not provided in
MICC-F2000 but is provided in MICC-F600 dataset. A detailed illustration of the copy-move forgery datasets is
abridged in Table3.
CoMoFoD [62] dataset has 260 image sets, which is divided into small image category and large image category.
Images are grouped in 5 groups. Every image set comprises of original images, colored mask, binary mask and
forged image.
• Small Image Category Database:
– It has 200 image sets
– Images of resolution 512*512
– Contains 40 images per transformation type
– Total number of images with postprocessed images are 10400
• Vast Image Category Database:
– It has 60 image sets
– Images of resolution 3000*2000
– Consists 10/20 images per transformation type
– Total number of images with postprocessed images are 3120

5.2. Image Splicing Datasets

Digital Video and Multimedia Lab (DVMM), at Columbia University created the first image splicing dataset which
is Columbia Image Splicing Detection Evaluation(CISDE) dataset [63]. CISDE dataset is for gray images. For color
images, DVMM developed Columbia Uncompressed Image Splicing Detection, Evaluation (CUISDE) dataset [64].
Another image grafting dataset is given by the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Institute of Automation (CASIA).
It gives the CASIA Tampered Image Detection Evaluation (TIDE) v1. 0 dataset and CASIA TIDE v2.0. CASIA

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498 AN ANALYSIS OF IMAGE FORGERY DETECTION TECHNIQUES

Table 4. Description of Image Splicing Datasets

Dataset Total no. of No. of No. of Image type Image Image

Images authentic tampered format resolution
Images Images
CISDE [63] 1845 933 912 Gray BMP 128*128
CUISDE [64] 363 183 180 Color TIFF 757*568,
1152*768
CASIA v1.0 [65] 1721 800 921 Color JPEG 384*256
CASIA v2.0 [66] 12,614 7491 5123 Color JPEG 240*160 to
BMP 900*600
TIFF

v2.0 is a broadened variant of CASIA v1.0 dataset [65, 66]. Altered images in these datasets are made utilizing
splicing operation from at least two images. With a specific end goal to leave no visually detectable trace, different
post-processing activities and geometric changes such as rotation, scaling and obscuring is applied on the tampered
images. A detailed illustration of image splicing datasets is given in Table 4.

6. Conclusion and Future Scope

The quickly developing enthusiasm for discovering passive techniques to approve the validness of a picture has
been seen throughout the most recent decade, in light of the significance advanced visual media plays in our life.
This paper introduced an overview of various passive image forgery detection techniques. A comparative analysis
of various forgery detection techniques is also presented. This paper also provides various types of data sets utilized
in the different approaches of forgery detection. The foremost drawback of the existing detection techniques which
can be worked on, is that the detection of forgery in proposed techniques needed human intervention. Another major
drawback in the discussed methods until now is that they do not succeed in differentiating malicious tampering from
innocent retouching. Also, the discussed methods specifically detect the forgery type for which they are developed,
they cannot detect any other forgery type present in the image. So, a unified robust method to identify any type
of forgery in the image is needed. There is a scope for extending the passive-blind forgery detection for audio
and video tampering. With the development of sophisticated artificial intelligence techniques, a promising solution
for digital image forensics is suggested. Although deep-learning-based approaches are promising, but they are not
powerful enough to give good performance in several digital image forensics applications. A considerable amount
of work is needed to be done on all these parameters.

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