There are several benefits of the information that is invisible to the human eye. “Invisible” here means that it can be visualized or quantified when using instruments. For example, it can improve security without compromising product design. We have succeeded in making an invisible digital image on a metal substrate using periodic repeatability by thin-film interference of niobium oxides. Although this digital information is invisible in the visible light wavelength range of 400-800nm, but detectable in the infrared light that of 800-1150nm. This technology has a potential to be applied to anti-counterfeiting and traceability.

Multimedia contents can be enriched by introducing navigation with image codes readable by camera-mounted mobile devices such as smartphones. Data hiding technologies were utilized for embedding such codes to make their appearances inconspicuous, which can reduce esthetic damage on visual media. This article proposes a method of embedding two-dimensional codes into images based on successive color mixture for a blue-color channel. This technology can make the color of codes mimic those used on a cover image, while preserving their readability for current general purpose image sensors.

Two-dimensional (2D) matrix symbols have higher storage capacity than conventional bar-codes, and hence have been used in various applications, including parts management in factories and Internet site addressing in camera-equipped mobile phones. These symbols generally utilize strong error control codes to protect data from errors caused by blots and scratches, and therefore require a large number of check bits. Because 2D matrix symbols are expressed in black and white dot patterns, blots and scratches often induce clusters of unidirectional errors (i.e., errors that affect black but not white dots, or vice versa). This paper proposes a new class of unidirectional lm ln-clustered error correcting codes capable of correcting unidirectional errors confined to a rectangle with lm rows and ln columns. The proposed code employs 2D interleaved parity-checks, as well as vertical and horizontal arithmetic residue checks. Clustered error pattern is derived using the 2D interleaved parity-checks, while vertical and horizontal positions of the error are calculated using the vertical and horizontal arithmetic residue checks. This paper also derives an upper bound on the number of codewords based on Hamming bound. Evaluation shows that the proposed code provides high code rate close to the bound. For example, for correcting a cluster of unidirectional 40 40 errors in 150 150 codeword, the code rate of the proposed code is 0.9272, while the upper bound is 0.9284.