Bluetooth-Based Positioning Method and Apparatus

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-2016094947-A1
Application number	US-201514863226-A
Country	US
Kind code	A1
Filing date	Sep 23, 2015
Priority date	Sep 25, 2014
Publication date	Mar 31, 2016
Grant date	—

Abstract

A Bluetooth-based positioning method and an apparatus thereof are disclosed. The method includes a mobile terminal receiving a Bluetooth signal transmitted by at least one Bluetooth beacon device; obtaining a media access control (MAC) address of each Bluetooth beacon device according to the received Bluetooth signal, and selecting Bluetooth beacon devices having a respective MAC address as a first MAC address to be reference devices; obtaining a Bluetooth signal strength and a broadcast beacon identifier of each reference device; and calculating a position of the mobile terminal according to the obtained Bluetooth signal strength and the obtained broadcast beacon identifier of each reference device. The method sets all the Bluetooth beacon devices to have a same MAC address, and MAC addresses of other normal Bluetooth devices are different from the MAC address of these Bluetooth beacon devices, thus effectively eliminating an interference from the other Bluetooth devices and preventing a malicious Bluetooth device from disguising a same beacon identifier to implement an accurate positioning.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1 . A method implemented by a computing device, the method comprising:
receiving a signal transmitted by one or more beacon devices of a plurality of beacon devices, the plurality of beacon devices sharing a same first media access control (MAC) address and broadcasting different beacon identifiers; obtaining a MAC address of each beacon device of the one or more beacon devices based at least in part on the received signal; selecting at least one beacon device having a respective MAC address as the first MAC address to be at least one reference device; obtaining a signal strength and a broadcast beacon identifier of each reference device of the at least one reference device based at least in part on the received signal; and calculating a position of the computing device based at least in part on the obtained signal strength and the obtained broadcast beacon identifier of each reference device.

2 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the signal transmitted by each beacon device comprises an encrypted signal that varies over time.

3 . The method of claim 2 , wherein obtaining the signal strength and the broadcast beacon identifier of each reference device comprises decrypting the received signal to obtain the broadcast beacon identifier of each reference device.

4 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
matching a fingerprint of the signal received by the computing device with fingerprints in a pre-generated fingerprint map; generating an initial particle set according to a matching result; and randomly assigning a different moving step size to each particle in the initial particle set.

5 . The method of claim 4 , wherein calculating the position of the computing device comprises:
updating position information of each particle in a previous particle set at a previous time point based at least in part on a number of moving steps, a moving direction, and a moving step size of each particle that are detected by the computing device at a current time point to obtain a current particle set; scoring an availability of each particle based at least in part on position information of each particle in the current particle set and a particular fingerprint received at the current time point; obtaining one or more moving step sizes of one or more particles having a respective score higher than a first predetermined threshold from the current particle set; and updating at least one moving step size of at least one particle having a respective score lower than the first predetermined threshold based at least in part on the one or more obtained moving step sizes.

6 . The method of claim 5 , wherein scoring the availability of each particle comprises:
obtaining respective position information and a respective signal strength of a fingerprint that is closest to each particle in the fingerprint map; and scoring the availability of each particle based at least in part on the particular fingerprint collected at the current time point and the respective position information and the respective signal strength of the fingerprint that is closest to each particle in the fingerprint map.

7 . The method of claim 6 , wherein the pre-generated fingerprint map is rasterized, and a correspondence relationship between each grid and an identifier of a respective fingerprint that is closest to each grid is stored in advance.

8 . The method of claim 7 , wherein obtaining the respective position information and the respective signal strength of the fingerprint that is closest to each particle in the fingerprint map comprises:
finding an identifier of a fingerprint that is closest to a grid where each particle is located in the fingerprint map based at least in part on the correspondence relationship; and obtaining the respective position information and the respective signal strength of the fingerprint that is closest to each particle based at least in part on the found identifier.

9 . The method of claim 5 , wherein: prior to obtaining the one or more moving step sizes of the one or more particles having the respective score higher than the first predetermined threshold from the current particle set, calculating the position of the computing device comprises:
calculating an aggregation degree of particles in the current particle set based at least in part on scores of the particles of the current particle set; and obtaining the one or more moving step sizes of the one or more particles having the respective score higher than the first predetermined threshold from the current particle set in response to the aggregation degree of the particles in the current particle set being higher than a first aggregation degree threshold.

10 . An apparatus comprising:
one or more processors; memory; a receiving unit stored in the memory and executable by the one or more processors to control the apparatus to receive a signal transmitted by one or more beacon devices of a plurality of beacon devices, wherein the plurality of beacon devices share a same first media access control (MAC) address and broadcast different beacon identifiers; a selection unit stored in the memory and executable by the one or more processors to obtain a MAC address of each beacon device of the one or more beacon devices based at least in part on the received signal, and select at least one beacon device having a respective MAC address as the first MAC address to be at least one reference device; an acquisition unit stored in the memory and executable by the one or more processors to obtain a signal strength and a broadcast beacon identifier of each reference device of the at least one reference device based at least in part on the received signal; and a computation unit stored in the memory and executable by the one or more processors to calculate a position of the apparatus based at least in part on the obtained signal strength and the obtained broadcast beacon identifier of each reference device.

11 . The apparatus of claim 10 , wherein the signal transmitted by each beacon device comprises a time-varying encrypted signal, and wherein the acquisition unit comprises a decryption module configured to decrypt the received signal to obtain the broadcast beacon identifier of each reference device.

12 . The apparatus of claim 10 , further comprising an initialization unit to match a fingerprint of the signal received by the apparatus with fingerprints in a pre-generated fingerprint map, generate an initial particle set according to a matching result, and randomly assign a different moving step size to each particle in the initial particle set before the calculation unit calculates the position of the apparatus.

13 . The apparatus of claim 12 , wherein the calculation unit comprises:
a particle update module configured to update position information of each particle in a previous particle set at a previous time point based at least in part on a number of moving steps, a moving direction, and a moving step size of each particle that are detected by the apparatus at a current time point to obtain a current particle set; a particle scoring module configured to score an availability of each particle based at least in part on position information of each particle in the current particle set and a particular fingerprint received at the current time point; a step size acquisition module configured to obtain one or more moving step sizes of one or more particles having a respective score higher than a first predetermined threshold from the current particle set; and a step size update module configured to update at least one moving step size of at least one particle havin

Assignees

• Alibaba Group Holding Ltd

Inventors

• Shen Hui
• Yao Yunjiao
• Qian Xiao
• Zhang Zhipeng
• Ma Hanbo

Classifications

• G01S5/0295

  Proximity-based methods, e.g. position inferred from reception of particular signals · CPC title

• H04W8/26

  Network addressing or numbering for mobility support · CPC title

• H04W4/008

  Electricity · mapped topic

• H04W8/005

  Discovery of network devices, e.g. terminals · CPC title

• H04W4/023 Primary

  using mutual or relative location information between multiple location based services [LBS] targets or of distance thresholds · CPC title