Hiding messages using fonts
A new computer technique has been developed that uses subtle changes to a document’s fonts to encode secret messages and data.
Using Columbia University’s FontCode system, however, users can hide messages within unrelated text via virtually-invisible changes to the displayed letters.
Developed by a team led by associate professor of computer science Changxi Zheng, FontCode works with commonly-used fonts such as Times Roman, Helvetica, and Calibri, plus it’s compatible with most word processing programs. Additionally, the hidden messages are retained even when the document is printed on paper or converted to a different file type.
The video at the link explains very nicely how this works. The technology has some excellent potentially positive applications, such as providing a method of finding out if an original document has been modified. It also carries with it a great potential for misuse because of its ability to hide information unobtrusively in a written document.
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A new computer technique has been developed that uses subtle changes to a document’s fonts to encode secret messages and data.
Using Columbia University’s FontCode system, however, users can hide messages within unrelated text via virtually-invisible changes to the displayed letters.
Developed by a team led by associate professor of computer science Changxi Zheng, FontCode works with commonly-used fonts such as Times Roman, Helvetica, and Calibri, plus it’s compatible with most word processing programs. Additionally, the hidden messages are retained even when the document is printed on paper or converted to a different file type.
The video at the link explains very nicely how this works. The technology has some excellent potentially positive applications, such as providing a method of finding out if an original document has been modified. It also carries with it a great potential for misuse because of its ability to hide information unobtrusively in a written document.
Readers!
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. Your support allows me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:
4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.
This seems to be an interesting cross between steganography and the font definition work of Donald Knuth.
And this will make even easier for one time pads or obscure books to pass messages……
If something is hidden in plain sight, one need only look to distinguish it. The privacy aspect of such schemes is found in the obscurity of algorithm particulars, not in algebraic complexity. I think the potential for anti-tampering (or some signature/authentication scheme) has utility but, again, with caveats.
Following up briefly: as the article points out, message privacy relies upon use of a (symmetric) key, so the advantage lies in concealing the very fact that a message is being transmitted (at all).
This is amazing technology. It also scares the hell out of me. Can you imagine the possibilities of encoding top secret documents and files and shipping them everywhere and anywhere and no one would know just by looking at them? Mary had a little lamb = destruct sequence code is 1A2B. Since you currently need a smart phone to see the real message or a computer to see it what about Google glasses or a type of 3D gaming viewer. The rest of the world goes on unknowing while a select few….
A number of years ago there was a sci-fi show where messages were somehow encoded into billboards and large signs on buildings. Yet wearing a special set of glasses the true message was revealed.
I admire the engineering, the development etc but the far reaching implications are frightening.
John Carpenter’s They Live (1988).
https://youtu.be/iJC4R1uXDaE