Abstract: An image encryption method for protecting data security and privacy is provided. A preferred embodiment and several alternate embodiments of the invention are disclosed. The method comprises mapping from the original data to a sequence of random numbers and creating a cipherimage based on that, wherein the cipherimage is the encrypted image. Optionally, the method can comprise the disassembling and reassembling of the cipherimage. The method can comprise further transformations. As a result, the original data are encrypted and embedded into the cipherimage and the secure encryption is achieved. Though the preferred embodiment and some alternate embodiments of the invention are described in the context of image encryption, the application of the method can be extended to the encryption of various kinds of digital data.