An efficient image encryption scheme using elementary cellular automata with novel permutation box

Digital image communication over public networks requires a high level of security to protect picture elements that represent information. Security is an important and challenging issue that can be solved using cryptography techniques. Generally, image encryption techniques are based on multiple rounds and iterations. In this paper, a secured lightweight cryptosystem is designed based on lookup table operations that reduce computational overhead, resource requirement and power consumption compared to traditional security mechanisms. In this context, one-dimensional elementary cellular automaton has been combined with Henon chaotic map to design a cryptosystem, which can produce unprecedented results in cryptography. Initially, state attractors for rule space are investigated and analyzed in Wolfram’s cellular automata to extract the properties and functional abilities to perform cryptographic operations. A novel algorithm of keyed transposition cipher is applied to digital image in P-Box module to produce shuffled image. Then, the extracted properties of ECA are preserved in a tabular form and further used in the diffusion process. Based on the simulation and comparison with other existing mechanisms, it is evident that the proposed algorithm is promising and obstructive to all kinds of statistical attacks, and it yields security primacy in various areas of cryptography. Encryption/Decryption is based on indexed based lookup tables principal using ECA and can be easily implemented using logic gates. The proposed algorithm provides confidentiality and can be adopted in IoT networks that require lightweight cryptography modules. Experimental results of color and gray images demonstrate flourishing results in the real-time environment of cryptography.