PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to develop an innovative information hiding algorithm.Design/methodology/approachThe proposed algorithm is based on image histogram statistics. Cumulative‐peak histogram regions are utilized to hide multiple bits of the secret message by performing histogram bin substitution. The embedding capacity, otherwise known as payload, and peak signal to noise ratio (PSNR), as well as security, are the main metrics used to evaluate the performance of the proposed algorithm.FindingsAccording to the obtained results, the proposed algorithm shows high embedding capacity and security at comparable PSNR compared with existing hiding information techniques.Originality/valueThe simplicity, security, random distribution of embedding pixels, and on‐demand high capacity are the key advantages of the proposed approach.

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to develop an innovative information hiding algorithm.Design/methodology/approachThe proposed algorithm is based on image histogram statistics. Cumulative‐peak histogram regions are utilized to hide multiple bits of the secret message by performing histogram bin substitution. The embedding capacity, otherwise known as payload, and peak signal to noise ratio (PSNR), as well as security, are the main metrics used to evaluate the performance of the proposed algorithm.FindingsAccording to the obtained results, the proposed algorithm shows high embedding capacity and security at comparable PSNR compared with existing hiding information techniques.Originality/valueThe simplicity, security, random distribution of embedding pixels, and on‐demand high capacity are the key advantages of the proposed approach.