Method and Device for Locating Terminal by Using Base Station

• US 20120122473A1
• Filed: 05/26/2010
• Published: 05/17/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 08/07/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: ZTE Corporation
• Original Assignee: ZTE Corporation
• Inventors: Gao, Yin, Wu, Hao
• Granted Patent: US 8,929,923 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 455/456.1
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 5/14 Determining absolute distances from a plurality of spaced points of known location
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 64/00 Locating users or terminals or network equipment for network management purposes, e.g. mobility management
• CPC Class Codes: Y02D 30/70 in wireless communication networks

Abstract

The present invention provides a method for locating a terminal by using a base station, and the method includes steps as follows: constructing a locating message by expanding a location report message or via an independent message; sending the locating message to a locating judgment center; and locating the terminal by using the locating message. The present invention is helpful to reduce the power consumption of the User Equipment (UE).

Claims

1. A method for locating a terminal by using a base station, comprising the steps of:

constructing a locating message by expanding a location report message or via an independent message;

sending the locating message to a locating judgment center; and

locating the terminal by using the locating message.

2. The method according to claim 1, wherein the locating message comprises information about a round trip time (RTT) for transmitting and receiving from the terminal to a current serving base station, a global identifier of a current serving cell of the terminal, information of the terminal and signal information of a neighbor cell.

3. The method according to claim 2, wherein the information about the RTT for transmitting and receiving from the terminal to the current serving base station is an RTT, or a distance from the terminal to the current serving base station calculated using the RTT.

4. The method according to claim 2, wherein the information of the terminal comprises one or more of the followings:

International Mobile Subscriber Identity (IMSI) of the terminal, a unique connection mark of the base station and the terminal at an S1 interface, and a unique connection mark of a mobility management entity and the terminal at the S1 interface.

5. The method according to claim 2, wherein the signal information of the neighbor cell comprises:

a global identifier of the neighbor cell, reference signal received power of the neighbor cell and/or reference signal received quality of the neighbor cell.

6. The method according to claim 2, wherein the locating message also comprises longitude and latitude information of the current serving base station.

7. The method according to claim 5, wherein the locating message also comprises path loss information, and the step of locating the terminal by using the locating message comprises:

acquiring cross information of the terminal in possible ranges of multiple cells by using the path loss information; and

the locating judgment center locating the terminal according to the cross information.

8. The method according to claim 1, wherein the locating judgment center is located at a core network element or an operation administration and management system.

9. A device for locating a terminal by using a base station, comprising:

a constructing unit, configured to construct a locating message by expanding a location report message or via an independent message;

a sending unit, configured to send the locating message to a locating judgment center; and

a locating unit, configured to locate the terminal by using the locating message.