Patent ID: 7821674

Claim:
An image processing apparatus comprising: a detecting unit that detects all pieces of additional information that are embedded in image data; a storage unit that stores the detected pieces of additional information in association with location information thereof; an analyzing unit that analyzes the detected pieces of additional information and judges whether any of the detected pieces of additional information includes predetermined information that is updateable; and an embedding unit that (1) updates, when a judgment result of the analyzing unit is affirmative, the predetermined information included in the piece of additional information, and embeds the piece of additional information including the updated predetermined information into the image data at a location where the piece of additional information is originally embedded, by referring to the stored location information, and (2) embeds, when the judgment result of the analyzing unit is negative, a new piece of additional information including updated information into the image data at a location that does not overlap locations where the detected pieces of additional information are embedded, by referring to the stored location information, the updated information being equivalent to the predetermined information.