A Novel Plaintext-Related Color Image Encryption Scheme Based on Cellular Neural Network and Chen’s Chaotic System

To address the problem that traditional stream ciphers are not sensitive to changes in the plaintext, a novel plaintext-related color image encryption scheme is proposed in this paper, which combines the 6-dimensional cellular neural network (CNN) and Chen’s chaotic system. This encryption scheme belongs to symmetric cryptography. In the proposed scheme, the initial key and switching function generated by the plaintext image are first utilized to control the CNN to complete the scrambling process. Then, Chen’s chaotic system is used to diffuse the scrambled image for realizing higher security. Finally, extensive performance evaluation is undertaken to validate the proposed scheme’s ability to offer the necessary security. Furthermore, the scheme is compared alongside state-of-the-art algorithms to establish its efficiency.