AURA: A Deep Dive
Dissecting the Authenticated Unified Raster Algorithm.
The Cover-Binding Advantage
AURA's premier feature is its AEAD scheme, designed to cryptographically bind the hidden message to the cover image. This prevents replay attacks where data is moved to a different image—a flaw in most steganography.
A Foundation of Trust
AURA is a cryptographic protocol, not a new algorithm. It was built exclusively with trusted, industry-standard primitives from the Botan C++ library: ChaCha20, HMAC-SHA512, and HKDF-SHA512.
Secret Pixel Path
Instead of a predictable scan, a ChaCha20-based CSPRNG generates a secret, non-sequential path for embedding data. This makes brute-force extraction and statistical analysis practically impossible.
In Short:
An AURA payload and its cover image are a matched set. Separating them breaks the cryptographic seal.