Underwater images often suffer from poor visibility due to photon scattering. However, in some cases, optical polarization filtering techniques can decrease the contribution of the scattered light and improve the visual image quality. In this Letter, the influence of these techniques for underwater image registration is analyzed, particularly when backscattered light is the main perturbation induced by the submarine environment. This analysis is performed using the Cramer-Rao bound and relies on a standard image formation model, taking into account various kinds of noises. (C) 2012 Optical Society of America