BLoc: CSI-based accurate localization for BLE tags

Roshan Ayyalasomayajula, Deepak Vasisht, Dinesh Bharadia

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingConference contribution

Abstract

Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) tags have become very prevalent over the last decade for tracking applications in homes as well as businesses. These tags are used to track objects, navigate people, and deliver contextual advertisements. However, in spite of the wide interest in tracking BLE tags, the primary methods of tracking them are based on signal strength (RSSI) measurements. Past work has shown that such methods are inaccurate, and prone to multipath and dynamic environments. As a result, localization using Wi-Fi has moved to Channel State Information (CSI, includes both signal strength and signal phase) based localization methods. In this paper, we seek to investigate what are the challenges that prevent BLE from adopting CSI based localization methods. We identify fundamental differences at the PHY layer between BLE and Wi-Fi, that make it challenging to extend CSI based localization to BLE. We present our system, BLoc, that incorporates novel, BLE-compatible algorithms to overcome these challenges and enable an accurate, multipath-resistant localization system. Our empirical evaluation shows that BLoc can achieve a localization accuracy of 86 cm with BLE tags, a 3X improvement over a state-of-the-art baseline.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Title of host publicationCoNEXT 2018 - Proceedings of the 14th International Conference on Emerging Networking EXperiments and Technologies
PublisherAssociation for Computing Machinery
Pages126-138
Number of pages13
ISBN (Electronic)9781450360807
DOIs
StatePublished - Dec 4 2018
Externally publishedYes
Event14th International Conference on Emerging Networking EXperiments and Technologies, CoNEXT 2018 - Heraklion, Greece
Duration: Dec 4 2018Dec 7 2018

Publication series

NameCoNEXT 2018 - Proceedings of the 14th International Conference on Emerging Networking EXperiments and Technologies

Conference

Conference14th International Conference on Emerging Networking EXperiments and Technologies, CoNEXT 2018
Country/TerritoryGreece
CityHeraklion
Period12/4/1812/7/18

Keywords

  • Bluetooth Low Energy
  • Indoor Localization
  • RF-based indoor positioning

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Computer Networks and Communications
  • Hardware and Architecture
  • Electrical and Electronic Engineering

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