A Joint Transform Correlator Encryption System Based on Binary Encoding for Grayscale Images

A binary encoding method for grayscale images is proposed to address their unsatisfactory decryption results from joint transform correlator (JTC) encryption systems. The method converts the encryption and decryption of grayscale images into that of binary images, and effectively improves decrypted-image quality. In the simulation, we replaced unencoded grayscale images with their binary encoded counterparts in the JTC encryption and decryption processes, then adopted a median filter to suppress saturation noise while keeping other settings unchanged. Accordingly, decrypted-image quality was clearly enhanced as the correlation coefficient (CC) between a decrypted image and its original rose from 0.8237 to 0.9473 initially, and then further to 0.9937, following the above two steps respectively. Finally, optical experimental results confirmed that the proposed encryption system works correctly.