CN102201930A

CN102201930A - Method and system for group management of MTC (machine type communication) equipment

Info

Publication number: CN102201930A
Application number: CN2010101415314A
Authority: CN
Inventors: 吴昊
Original assignee: ZTE Corp
Current assignee: ZTE Corp
Priority date: 2010-03-25
Filing date: 2010-03-25
Publication date: 2011-09-28
Anticipated expiration: 2030-03-25
Also published as: WO2011116603A1; CN102201930B

Abstract

The invention provides a method and system for group management of MTC (machine type communication) equipment. The method comprises the following steps: obtaining the group information of the group of the MTC; and combining the MTC equipment with common features in the characteristics of the group information into a new MTC group. Through the method provided by the invention, the MTC equipment with common features forms a new MTC group and is managed, the network signaling load is lightened, the management flows are reduced, and network jam is avoided.

Description

Method and system for grouping management of MTC (machine type communication) equipment

Technical Field

The present invention relates to Machine Type Communication (MTC) technologies, and in particular, to a method and a system for performing group management on MTC devices.

Background

Fig. 1 is a schematic structural diagram of an existing cellular wireless communication system, and as shown in fig. 1, the cellular wireless communication system mainly includes a Core Network (CN), an Access Network (RAN), and a terminal. The core network is responsible for non-access stratum transactions such as terminal location update, and the core network is an anchor point of a user plane. The access network is responsible for access stratum transactions such as management of radio resources, and the like, and includes base stations, or base stations and base station controllers, where there may be physical or logical connections between the base stations according to actual situations, such as connections between base stations 1 and 2 and between base stations 1 and 3 in fig. 1, and each base station may be connected to one or more core network nodes. A terminal is a User Equipment (UE), and refers to various devices such as a mobile phone or a notebook computer, which can communicate with a cellular wireless communication network.

The MTC service refers to a service for performing communication between machines, and all communication is performed by machines without human participation in the MTC service. The MTC service obtains data through sensing equipment such as a sensor, reports the data to a mobile communication network through a communication module, and accesses to a public data network through the mobile communication network, for example, the MTC service is applied to logistics monitoring, safety monitoring, remote medical detection, remote meter reading and the like. The data is managed by a specific MTC server of a mobile operator or a special MTC operator and can be viewed by MTC users or MTC managers. In this process, the device that acquires the data required by the service is the MTC device.

The MTC service is different from the conventional mobile communication service, and for an MTC user, there may be multiple MTC devices, for example, in the remote meter reading service, thousands of remote meters as MTC devices may all belong to an MTC user of a certain power company, so as to facilitate management of the remote meters belonging to the same MTC user, and group more remote meters, so as to reduce control signaling, and facilitate management and charging. Currently, in order to facilitate group management, MTC devices belonging to the same MTC user are divided into the same group, and related group information is stored in a subscriber home server (HSS). In the MTC service execution process, a Mobility Management Entity (MME) acquires the grouping information of the MTC equipment from an HSS, and manages the MTC equipment according to the grouping information.

Here, the HSS is an entity in the telecommunications network for holding identity information, authentication information, authorization information, etc. of a user or terminal device. According to different situations, the HSS can be configured to store the identity information of the user and the binding information between the user and the terminal device, or only store the identity information of the user (the binding information between the user and the terminal device may be stored by the gateway), or directly store the identity information of the terminal device. The HSS is also responsible for the subscription database of the user, and performs authentication and authorization of the user, etc. The service platform may query subscriber or terminal information from the HSS. The MME is an entity for managing user terminal control signaling in a core network, and is responsible for access control, including authentication control, identifier (GUTI, TAI list) assignment, user identifier and device identifier verification, signaling plane encryption, consistency protection with an evolved base station (eNB), conversion of security parameters and quality of service (QoS) parameters between 2G/3G and EPS, access admission control, determining whether requested resources can be obtained and reserving the resources, lawful interception, mobility management (implementing tracking and recording of the current location of the UE), session management, related operations on EPS bearers, network element selection, selection of a serving gateway (S-GW) and a packet data network gateway (P-GW), and selection of a target MME/S4SGSN during handover.

In some scenarios, for example, there are MTC logistics monitoring devices of multiple MTC users on a moving container, mobility management of these MTC logistics monitoring devices has the same signaling and procedures, and if this type of MTC devices is managed according to the existing grouping method, network signaling load and management procedures will be increased, thereby causing network congestion.

Disclosure of Invention

In view of this, the main objective of the present invention is to provide a method and a system for performing group management on MTC devices, which can reduce network signaling load and management procedures, and avoid network congestion.

In order to achieve the purpose, the technical scheme of the invention is realized as follows:

a method of group management of Machine Type Communication (MTC) devices, the method comprising:

acquiring group information of a group to which Machine Type Communication (MTC) equipment belongs;

the MTC devices having common characteristics in the characteristics of the group information are merged into a new MTC group.

The merging MTC devices with common characteristics into a new MTC group comprises:

the method comprises the steps that a Mobility Management Entity (MME) merges MTC devices with common characteristics into a new MTC group, a new MTC group identifier is allocated to the new MTC group, group information of the new MTC group is associated with group information of a group to which each MTC device belongs and then stored in the MME locally.

The method further comprises the following steps:

and for new MTC equipment with the common characteristics of the MTC equipment in the new MTC group, associating the group information of the group to which the new MTC equipment belongs with the group information of the new MTC group, and enabling the new MTC equipment to become a group member of the new MTC group.

The method further comprises the following steps:

and for the MTC equipment in the new MTC group, if the MTC equipment does not have the common characteristics of belonging to the new group any more, deleting the group information of the group to which the MTC equipment belongs from the new MTC group.

The common characteristics are:

the MTC devices belonging to different MTC groups have the same MTC characteristics; or,

the MTC devices belonging to different MTC groups are in the same position; or,

MTC devices belonging to different MTC groups have the same mobility.

The MTC characteristic is a time control characteristic, or a time tolerance characteristic.

A system for grouping management of MTC devices comprises at least a Mobility Management Entity (MME) and a subscriber home server (HSS), wherein,

the MME is used for obtaining group information of groups to which different MTC devices belong from the HSS and merging the MTC devices with common characteristics in the characteristics of the group information into a new MTC group;

and the HSS is used for storing the group information of the group to which the different MTC devices belong and providing the group information to the MME.

The MME is further used for associating the group information of the group to which the MTC device belongs with the group information of the new MTC group when the MTC device with the common characteristics of the MTC devices in the new MTC group is detected.

The MME is further used for canceling association between group information of a group to which the MTC device belongs and group information of the new MTC group when the MTC device which does not have the common characteristics and belongs to the new MTC group is detected in the new MTC group.

The common characteristics are:

the MTC devices belonging to different MTC groups are in the same position; or,

MTC devices belonging to different MTC groups have the same mobility.

It can be seen from the above technical solutions provided by the present invention that the method of the present invention includes obtaining group information of a group to which the MTC devices belong, and merging the MTC devices having a common characteristic in the characteristics of the group information into a new MTC group. By the method, the MTC devices with the common characteristics form a new MTC group, and the MTC devices with the common characteristics are managed, so that the network signaling load and the management flow are reduced, and the network congestion is avoided.

Drawings

Fig. 1 is a block diagram of a conventional cellular wireless communication system;

FIG. 2 is a flowchart illustrating a method for group management of MTC devices according to the present invention;

FIG. 3 is a schematic diagram of a system configuration for group management of MTC devices according to the present invention;

fig. 4 is a flowchart illustrating an embodiment of grouping management of MTC devices according to the present invention.

Detailed Description

Fig. 2 is a flowchart of a method for performing group management on MTC devices according to the present invention, as shown in fig. 2, including the following steps:

step 200: group information of a group to which the MTC device belongs is acquired.

In this step, the MME obtains group information of a group to which different MTC devices belong from the HSS, where the group information includes a group identifier, and/or a group member identifier, and/or a group characteristic.

Step 201: the MTC devices having common characteristics in the characteristics of the group information are merged into a new MTC group. Here, MTC devices may belong to different groups, or may belong to the same group.

In this step, the MME merges MTC devices having a common characteristic into a new MTC group, allocates a new MTC group identifier, and associates group information of the new MTC group with group information of a group to which each MTC device belongs, and stores the group information in the MME locally. It should be noted that the new MTC group in this step may be a temporary MTC group or a formal MTC group, and if the new MTC group is a temporary MTC group, the new group identifier is a temporary group identifier, and the group information of the temporary MTC group is only stored in the local MME after being associated with the group information of the group to which each MTC device belongs, so that when the MME determines that uniform mobility management is not required for MTC devices in the newly-created MTC group, for example, after goods arrive at a destination, the MME may delete the temporary group by itself; if the new MTC group is a formal MTC group, the related information needs to be recorded in the HSS as the existing MTC group, and the operation is consistent with the existing MTC group, which is not described herein again.

Wherein the common features are as follows (which are merely illustrative and not intended to limit the scope of the common features):

(1) the MTC devices belonging to different MTC groups have the same MTC characteristics, for example, the MTC devices all have a time control characteristic, that is, the MTC devices receive and transmit data at a preset fixed time; or time-tolerant characteristics, i.e., allowing MTC devices to delay their data transmission and reception when network load is large, etc.;

(2) the MTC devices belonging to different MTC groups are in the same position;

(3) MTC devices belonging to different MTC groups have the same mobility, such as initiating mobility management requests at the same location and at the same time.

The method of the invention also comprises the following steps: for new MTC equipment with the common characteristics of the MTC equipment in the established temporary MTC group, associating the group information of the group to which the new MTC equipment belongs with the group information of the temporary MTC group, and enabling the new MTC equipment to become a member of the temporary MTC group;

the method of the invention also comprises the following steps: for the MTC devices in the temporary MTC group, if the MTC devices do not have the common characteristics of belonging to the temporary group, for example, the MME detects that an MTC device initiates an offline application, or the tracking area to which the MTC device belongs is not in the range of the tracking area list associated with the temporary group, and so on, then delete the group information of the group to which the MTC device belongs from the temporary MTC group (i.e., cancel the association between the group information of the group to which the MTC device belongs and the group information of the temporary group).

By the method, the MTC devices with the common characteristics form a new MTC group, and the MTC devices with the common characteristics are managed, so that the network signaling load and the management flow are reduced, and the network congestion is avoided.

Fig. 3 is a schematic diagram of a system configuration for performing group management on MTC devices according to the present invention, as shown in fig. 3, at least including an MME and an HSS, wherein,

and the MME is used for obtaining the group information of the groups to which the different MTC devices belong from the HSS and merging the MTC devices with common characteristics in the characteristics of the group information into a new MTC group.

The MME in the present system is further configured to detect an MTC device having a common characteristic of MTC devices in a new MTC group, and associate group information of a group to which the MTC device belongs with group information of the new MTC group.

The MME in the present system is further configured to, when detecting an MTC device existing in the new MTC group and no longer having the common characteristic of belonging to the new MTC group, cancel association between group information of a group to which the MTC device belongs and group information of the new MTC group.

The process of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to examples.

Fig. 4 is a flowchart of an embodiment of performing group management on MTC devices according to the present invention, in this embodiment, assuming that MTC users need to monitor goods carried in a container, in order to meet the requirement of a network operator to avoid network congestion caused by signaling of a large amount of devices, the MTC users and the network operator sign a group management mode to perform mobility management on their respective MTC devices; and the network operator stores the MTC device subscription information specified by the MTC users in the HSS, wherein group identifications distributed by the network operator, identifications of group members contained in each group and corresponding characteristics of the group are recorded. The specific recording mode may be: the identification of a single MTC device is used as an index, and the group identification and/or the group characteristic of the MTC device are added in the corresponding information. As shown in fig. 4, the method specifically includes:

step 400: after the MTC device is started, an attachment request is sent to a network.

Step 401: after receiving an attach request of the MTC equipment, the MME obtains information of the MTC equipment, including security certificates, service quality parameters, MTC subscription data and the like, from the HSS, authenticates the MTC equipment according to the information, and sends an attach request receiving signaling to the MTC equipment if the authentication is passed.

Step 402 to step 403: and the MME judges whether MTC equipment in different groups initiate a switching request or a tracking area updating request at the same position and moment according to the tracking area to which the MTC equipment belongs and the moment when the mobility management process occurs. For MTC devices of different groups which initiate a switching request or a tracking area updating request at the same position and time, a new group is created, and a temporary group identifier is allocated to the new group.

In this step, after the MTC device attaches to the network, the MME can know the location of the MTC device on the accuracy of the tracking area. The MTC device performs tracking area update or handover in the mobility process, and needs to send a signaling to the MME, which controls the mobility management process.

If the MTC equipment belonging to different groups meets the requirement, namely, a switching request or a tracking area updating request is initiated at the same position and time, a new group is created, and a temporary group identifier is allocated to the new group. Here, the temporary group identifier means that the group information is not recorded in the subscription information in the HSS but is stored only in the MME. Then, the MTC groups to be combined together are associated with the temporary group identifier, that is, the corresponding MTC groups and their corresponding group information may be retrieved through the temporary group identifier.

Further, after the MME creates the temporary MTC group, the method further includes step 404: when the MTC device in the new temporary group initiates a handover or tracking area update request, the MME interacts, according to information associated with the temporary group identifier, all the MTC devices included in the temporary group with the target MME through a single MME control signaling, such as a single handover request signaling, a handover response signaling, and an MTC device context forwarding signaling. Therefore, the network signaling overhead can be reduced, and network congestion caused by a large number of MTC groups can be avoided.

Further, if after the MME creates the new group, it further includes step 405: if the new MTC equipment is detected to accord with the common characteristics of the temporary group, the MTC equipment identification is associated to the temporary group identification to become a group member of the temporary group; and if the MME detects that the MTC equipment in the temporary group initiates an offline application or the tracking area to which the MTC equipment belongs is not in the range of the tracking area list associated with the temporary group, deleting the MTC equipment identification and the information related to the MTC equipment identification from the temporary group.

The above description is only exemplary of the present invention and should not be taken as limiting the scope of the present invention, and any modifications, equivalents, improvements, etc. that are within the spirit and principle of the present invention should be included in the present invention.

Claims

1. A method of group management for Machine Type Communication (MTC) devices, the method comprising:

2. The method of claim 1,

3. The method of claim 2, further comprising:

4. The method of claim 2, further comprising:

5. The method according to any one of claims 1 to 4, wherein the common characteristic is:

the MTC devices belonging to different MTC groups are in the same position; or,

MTC devices belonging to different MTC groups have the same mobility.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein the MTC characteristic is a time control characteristic or a time tolerance characteristic.

7. A system for group management of MTC devices, characterized by comprising at least a Mobility Management Entity (MME) and a subscriber home server (HSS), wherein,

8. The system of claim 7, wherein the MME is further configured to, upon detecting an MTC device having common characteristics of MTC devices in the new MTC group, associate group information of a group to which the MTC device belongs with group information of the new MTC group.

9. The system of claim 7, wherein the MME is further configured to, upon detecting an MTC device in the new MTC group that does not have common characteristics of belonging to the new MTC group, disassociate group information of the group to which the MTC device belongs from group information of the new MTC group.

10. The system according to any one of claims 7 to 9, wherein the common characteristic is:

the MTC devices belonging to different MTC groups are in the same position; or,

MTC devices belonging to different MTC groups have the same mobility.