High Definition Image Encryption Algorithm Based on AES Modification

In this article, a high-speed and highly restricted encryption algorithm is proposed to cipher high-definition (HD) images based on the modified advanced encryption standard (AES) algorithm. AES is a well-known block cipher algorithm and has several advantages, such as high-level security and implementation ability. However, AES has some drawbacks, including high computation costs, pattern appearance, and high hardware requirements. The aforementioned problems become more complex when the AES algorithm ciphers an image, especially HD images. Three modifications are proposed in this paper to improve AES algorithm performance through, decreasing the computation costs, decreasing the hardware requirements, and increasing the security level. First, modification was conducted using MixColumn transformation in 5 rounds instead of 10 rounds in the original AES-128 to decrease the encryption time. Security is enhanced by improving the key schedule operation by adding MixColumn transformation to this operation as second modification. In addition, to decrease the hardware requirements, S-box and Inv. S-box in the original AES are replaced by one simple S-box used for encryption and decryption in the proposed method. The proposed AES version conducts one of the ciphering modes to solve the appearance pattern problem. Experimental results indicate that the proposed modifications to the AES algorithm made the algorithm more compatible with HD image encryption.