Reversible data hiding schemes generally show the advantage in integrity authentication, among which, histogram shifting (HS) technique is a special hot-spot due to its high effectiveness. However, HS processes generally employ empirical search criterions for side information (peak and zero bins) to reduce computation complexity, accordingly, resulting in the reduction of algorithm performance, such as low embedding capacity. To solve the problem, an adaptive side information selection method for dealing with various capacities (from low to large payloads) is proposed in this paper. It could determine the nearly optimal combination of side information based on the given payload. The proposed method employs a multi-feature based sorting technique is employed to search for smoother areas for data hiding, and designs an intelligent optimization algorithm to determine the optimal side information, thus resulting in a high performance. Experimental results show the proposed scheme could conduct information hiding for different quantities of payloads with superior performance.
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