WO2010083654A1

WO2010083654A1 - Method and related device for realizing protection of the privacy of user location information

Info

Publication number: WO2010083654A1
Application number: PCT/CN2009/070296
Authority: WO
Inventors: 谢俊清
Original assignee: 阿尔卡特朗讯公司
Priority date: 2009-01-23
Filing date: 2009-01-23
Publication date: 2010-07-29
Also published as: CN102293021A

Abstract

A method for processing location information on location server, the method includes that a location updating information is received from a mobile terminal and a target requests the location updating information from the location server. The method also includes that: at least one rule is pre-saved for the mobile terminal, and at least one rule comprises a condition part and an action part; a decision request which comprises the location updating information and at least one condition parameter is created when the location updating information is received from the mobile terminal; at least one condition parameter in the decision request is compared with the condition part; and if at least one condition parameter matches the condition part, the action prescribed by the action part is executed for the target. A location server and a mobile terminal which execute the location information processing are provided in the invention.

Description

Method and related device for realizing user location information privacy protection

The present invention relates to the processing of location information of users in a communication network, and more particularly to location servers, mobile terminals and related methods for protecting location information of users. Background technique

Currently, mobile phones equipped with GPS enter the market at a lower price. According to a report by the ABI Research Institute in 2008, shipments of GPS-enabled mobile phones will exceed 550 million units in 2012. In addition, major smart phone operating systems, such as Symbian, Windows Mobi le and Android, are ready to use GPS. This trend has greatly contributed to the development of location-based services (LBS). Common examples of location-based services are personal navigation, emergency response, location-based games, location-based advertising, dating, and more.

In general, there are two GPS-enabled LBS location consumption modes: self-use and public use. Personal navigation is a typical case where GPS locations are used by themselves (ie, locally consumed) in mobile devices. However, for many other LBSs, the GPS location is commonly used: The mobile device typically sends a location update to a particular component of the location server, and then the LBS will consume the location and perform the appropriate action.

A key issue with location servers is how to protect the privacy of end users because location is private information for end users. When a user's location is disclosed to an unauthorized entity, it can have a negative impact. In particular, GPS is the most accurate positioning technique currently used to determine the position of a user. Therefore, for location servers, it is especially important to implement strong and flexible privacy controls for GPS locations.

In location servers from standardization organizations and different equipment vendors, there are some solutions to the privacy protection of user locations. The most famous of these is the Open Mobile Alliance. (OMA) Privacy Check Protocol (PCP) and Fi reEag le from Yahoo. The PCP defines the protocol used between the Location Server (LS) and the Location Privacy Checking Entity (PCE) in a generic Mobile Location Services (MLS) architecture. The PCE implements a location access control decision and a virtual ID/real ID mutual mapping (pseudonym/ver inym mediat ion). However, these specifications only focus on the protocol and do not define any details on how to implement the PCE. In addition, the PCE is designed for general location rather than GPS location.

The Fi reEag le platform from Yahoo does not provide a location licensing mechanism that allows users to configure location accuracy levels for different applications. The accuracy level comes from the exact location (for example, GPS location and detailed physical address), zip code, adjacent/local area, metropolitan area, county, country. However, if the end user only provides the GPS position, there is no way to adjust the precision further. In addition, the positional accuracy from FireEagle is independent of the rules and cannot be adjusted based on the current time and position of the end user. Therefore, this model is not powerful and flexible for adjusting their GPS position. Summary of the invention

It is an object of the present invention to provide a rule based location information privacy control mechanism that can be applied to a location server and enables an end user to:

- Configuring location information for different applications based on current time and location; - adjusting the accuracy of visible location information for different applications based on current time and location;

- Reduce the cost of end users and the computational cost of location servers through a distributed privacy control structure.

To achieve the above object, the present invention provides a method of processing location information on a location server, the method comprising receiving location update information from a mobile terminal and requesting, by the target application, the location update information from the location server, wherein The method further includes: pre-storing at least one rule for the mobile terminal, the at least one rule including a condition part and an action part; generating a package when receiving location update information from the mobile terminal a decision request including the location update information and the at least one condition parameter; comparing the at least one condition parameter in the decision request with the condition portion; and if the at least one condition parameter matches the condition portion And executing the action specified in the action part for the target application.

In a preferred embodiment according to the present invention, the condition part is at least one of an identifier, a time period, and a moving area of the target application, and in a case where the condition part is an identifier of the target application, At least one condition parameter is an identifier of a target application requesting the GPS location information from the location server; where the condition portion is a time period, the at least one condition parameter is receiving GPS location information from the mobile terminal The current time; and, in the case where the condition portion is a mobile area, the at least one condition parameter is a mobile area of the mobile terminal.

In addition, the present invention also provides a location server for use in a communication network, comprising: means for receiving location update information from a mobile terminal; and means for providing the location update information to the target application, wherein the location server further comprises And a user data storage device, configured to pre-store at least one rule for the mobile terminal, where the at least one rule includes a condition part and an action part; and the decision request generating apparatus is configured to generate, when receiving the location update information from the mobile terminal, a decision request including the location update information and the at least one condition parameter; a rule calculation device, configured to compare the at least one condition parameter in the decision request with the condition portion; and a decision result execution device, if The at least one condition parameter is matched with the condition portion, and the action specified by the action portion is performed for the target application.

The present invention also relates to a method of processing location information on a mobile terminal, comprising receiving location update information from a location device and transmitting the location update information to a location server, wherein the method further comprises: pre-targeting the mobile terminal Storing at least one rule, the at least one rule including a condition part and an action part; and when receiving the location update information, generating a decision request including the location update information and the at least one condition parameter; At least one condition parameter is associated with the condition portion Comparing; and, if the at least one condition parameter matches the conditional portion, performing an action specified by the action portion for the location server.

In a preferred embodiment in accordance with the present invention, the action specified by the action portion is to inhibit transmission of the location update information to the location server.

The present invention also relates to a mobile terminal equipped with a positioning function, comprising: means for receiving location update information from a positioning device; and means for providing the location update information to the location server, wherein the mobile terminal further comprises: a user data storage device And at least one rule is pre-stored for the mobile terminal, where the at least one rule includes a condition part and an action part; and the decision request generating means is configured to: when the location update information is received from the positioning apparatus, generate the location update a decision request of the information and the at least one condition parameter; a rule calculation means for comparing the at least one condition parameter in the decision request with the condition part; and a decision result execution means if the at least one condition parameter Matching the conditional portion, the action specified by the action portion is performed for the location server.

The basic idea of the invention includes two aspects: a rule-based privacy control mechanism and a distributed privacy control structure.

In the process of updating GPS locations from mobile devices, rule-based privacy control introduces rule computing devices. The rule computing device allows the end user to establish a rule group in the form of (target, time, region, action), so that the end user can apply to different targets based on the current time (time) and the region (reg ion). , about the same GPS position update setting action (act ion). In addition, when the action is "exposed", the mechanism supports fine adjustment of the GPS position, which protects the real position of the end user.

Using the computing performance of the mobile device, the distributed privacy control structure distributes a portion of the rules from the location server to the end user's mobile device, and the number of GPS location updates sent from the location server can be reduced. Therefore, by reducing the number of GPS updates from mobile devices, this mechanism can reduce the cost and location of end users in data services. The computing cost of the server. DRAWINGS

Other objects and advantages of the present invention will become more apparent and appreciated from the description of the appended claims appended claims

1 shows a block diagram of a rule-based privacy control structure according to the present invention; FIG. 2 shows an example of a location information precision adjustment process;

Figure 3 shows a flow chart of a method in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention;

Figure 4a shows a rule management structure in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention, and Figure 4b shows a specific calculation process in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention;

Fig. 5 shows a functional block diagram of a location server according to an embodiment of the present invention; Fig. 6 shows a rule calculation process performed by a mobile terminal according to the present invention. detailed description

Figure 1 illustrates a rule based privacy control structure in accordance with one embodiment of the present invention. In Figure 1, the portion to the left of the dashed line represents the workflow of a conventional public user location: The mobile device 101 obtains its location from an internal GPS driver or an external GPS device, and then sends the location to the data connection via the wireless communication network to Location server 102. The one or more location applications 103 have subscribed to the location server 102 for location update information and receive GPS location updates as agreed, the location application 103 sharing the location provided by the location server 102 over a public network such as the Internet. Finally, these applications perform operations based on the location received from the location server.

In such a workflow, the original (ie, real) GPS location will be sent to the target application via the location server without any modification. Of course, with the support of the basic privacy control mechanism like Yahoo Fi reEag le, the end user can set whether to expose the real GPS location to a specific target application. And, if the end user chooses not to disclose the real GPS location, the related application cannot obtain the location of the user until he/ She then manually resets the initial settings.

The portion to the right of the broken line indicates the rule-based privacy control of the present invention introduced on the basis of the conventional structure. Rule computing device 105 is coupled to and interacts with location server 102. The rule database 104 stores a predefined rule template, which may be a standard form including a quaternion parameter set (target, time, region, action), which is preset by the network administrator. User data storage 106 is used to store rules pre-set by the user, which in the embodiment according to the invention is preferably a user data database. The user interface 107 is typically a web-based graphical user interface (GUI) that allows the user to enter rules parameters. In general, when the data format input by the user storage device 106 does not conform to the (target, time, region, action) standard template stored in the rule database 104, the system prompts the user to re-enter.

It should be noted that the structure shown in Figure 1 is merely illustrative. The rules computing device 105 may exist as part of the location server 102, which may also be a physically separate component. The two databases 104 and 106 are shown in the figure. Actually, according to the specific implementation environment, the two databases can also be combined into one to store the hidden and exposed rules preset by the user.

In a preferred embodiment of the invention, the rules may be a collection of (target, time, region, action). Users can set a set of rules at different times for different targets in advance. In the rule computing device of the present invention, the calculation or comparison of rules can be performed in a programming language similar to the "if-then..." conditional control: If (target is A, time is within B and GPS location update in region C) then act ion D.

Wherein, the target represents a location-based target application, and the application requests to obtain location information of the terminal user. It can be a specific application, and it can also represent "all" applications when it is necessary to set a rule for all possible target applications.

Time indicates the period of time when the rule is implemented. It can include a specific time of year, month, day, and day, or it can be a type of day (for example, weekdays, weekends, mondays) Saturday, Sunday, etc.). Time can be set manually by the user via a device such as a user interface, or can be entered by other applications (eg, a soft Out look).

In addition, the t ime parameter used in the rule can be further extended to context, which represents the current environment, timetable, activity, and even the user's emotions. Context can be defined as a combination of different input parameters (ie, end user's schedule, activity). In addition, for many context input parameters, there should be an interface that allows the rule computing device to obtain the current value of the parameter.

Region is set by the end user. In general, reg ions can be of any shape. However, for ease of calculation, the reg ion is preferably rectangular or circular. The end user may or may not want the application to find or track his/her location within the location area. An obvious example is that end users don't want to let others know their location information near their home.

There are two types of rule output, the act ion result: Hide and Expose( error ).

Hide: If the end user wishes to hide the target application at the current time and location, the GPS location will not be sent to the target application.

Expose ( error ): If the end user chooses to expose his or her location information to the target application at the current time and location, the GPS location will be sent to the target application.

(1) If error = 0, the GPS position will be sent to the target application without modification; (2) If error>0, the GPS position will be adjusted before publication.

Figure 2 shows an example of a precision adjustment process. In Figure 2, the GPS real position is in the region with the center point cl and the error radius rl. The new center point will move a distance from cl (the distance is 0 to the error value), and the radius to be exposed will become the sum of error and the actual error radius rl. Therefore, it can be seen that the adjustment process causes the resulting position to still cover the real position, but with an adjusted center point and a larger margin of error, that is, the position information provided to the target application is "fuzzy".

It should be noted that the above rules may be used in a location server or a mobile terminal. Preferably, only one set of hide rules is set for the mobile terminal, and most of the calculations are performed by the location server. 3 is a flow chart showing the processing of GPS location information by a location server in accordance with the present invention. First, in step 301, the mobile terminal 101 equipped with a GPS circuit or an external GPS device transmits GPS location update information to the location server 102.

In step 301 of the method, the GPS-equipped mobile terminal transmits the GPS location update to the location server in a conventional manner, i.e., does not hide any GPS location updates.

In step 302, the location server 102 does not pass the GPS location update directly to the particular location application as is conventional, but sends a decision request to the rule computing device 105, ie, "hidden" or "exposure" the GPS to a particular target application. Location update? And what accuracy is used to expose location information when an "exposed" GPS location update needs to be applied to a specific target? The decision request should include the parameters required for the decision: GPS location information, target application identification, current time (ie, the time the request was sent). How to obtain these parameters is well known to those skilled in the art and will not be described again in order to avoid unnecessarily obscuring the present invention.

In step 303, the rule calculation means 105 performs rule calculation (rule comparison). It should be noted here that the rules of comparison have been previously input by the user through the user interface 107 of FIG. 1 and stored in the user data storage device 106. In the embodiment of the present invention, the rules stored in the user data storage device 106 may be Use the four-tuple form of (target, t ime , reg ion, ac t ion ). According to the decision request provided from the location server, the rule computing device compares the GPS location information, the target application identifier, and the current time contained therein with the rules stored in the user data storage device 106, when the values fall within the corresponding rule range Then, the result corresponding to the rule is executed, that is, the GPS location information is hidden or exposed, and the location information is exposed with the accuracy when the GPS location information is selected to be exposed. The specific rule calculation method will give a more specific implementation in Figure 4b. In step 304, if the decision result given by the rule calculation device is "Hide", this means that the end user wishes to apply to the target at the current time and location. Hide your location. In this case, the location server does not send GPS location updates to specific target applications. As shown in step 305.

If the decision result is not "Hide", it is "Expose", which means that the end user chooses to send the GPS location to the target application at the current time and location. In this case, the rule computing device will also continue to query the relevant precision settings. In this example, the error parameter is set, which controls how accurate the GPS position from the end user is sent to the target application. In step 306, it is determined whether the error is 0:

(1) If error = 0, the GPS position will be sent to the target application without modification, as shown in step 307;

(2) If error>0, the GPS position will be adjusted before publication, as shown in step 308.

The precision adjustment process here can be completely combined with the example given in Figure 2. The GPS real position is in the area with the center point cl and the error radius rl. The user can set the error value to 200 meters in advance, and the new center point will be removed from cl by a distance from 0 to 200 meters, and the radius to be exposed will become rl + 200 meters. Therefore, it can be seen that the adjustment process causes the resulting position to still cover the real position, but with an adjusted center point and a larger margin of error, that is, the position information provided to the target application is "fuzzy".

In the privacy control mechanism according to the present invention, the location disclosed to the target application can be closely related to the user's environment (current time, current GPS location, etc.). End users can preset a set of rules for location disclosure preferences: based on their current environment, whether and how to expose the current actual location. The privacy control mechanism will then automatically adjust the open location without manual intervention.

For the person skilled in the art, different comparison or calculation methods can be envisaged in the context of understanding the basic idea of the invention. The conditional control parameters used for comparison need not be a combination of target , ime and reg ion , or any of these three or envision other parameters, such as the context parameter mentioned above. In this paper, rule parameters can also be called condition control parameters.

The simplest examples of several different control parameters are given below: Example 1: With target as the rule parameter, the mobile terminal user can apply the target setting rule for different targets in advance. For example, for a target like emergency response or emergency rescue, the exposure of the real GPS position is set. For emergency rescue, of course, the location information is more The more accurate it is. For applications such as location-based advertising, you can choose to expose location information with a "fuzzy" precision. You can set up such a set of rules like this:

If ( target is emergency response ) then expose (0)

If ( target is location-based service ) then expose ( 200 ) Example 2: Using time as the rule parameter

The mobile terminal user can set rules for different time periods in advance, for example, for location-based advertisements, it can be set to expose location information on a working day with an accuracy of, for example, 100 meters, and hide GPS location information on weekends. Rule:

If ( time is within weekday ) then expose (100)

If (time is within weekend ) then hide

As mentioned above, in step 303 of Fig. 3, the rule calculation means can perform a rule comparison using different methods to determine the rule result, that is, hide or expose (error). Figures 4a and 4b show an embodiment of a rule comparison device for performing a rule comparison. Figure 4a shows the rule management structure used in this example, and Figure 4b shows the specific calculation process. It can be seen that this is a calculation method for using ( target, time, region, act ion ) as the standard ' J .

For each GPS location update from the mobile terminal, all relevant rules can be calculated one by one. However, with such a calculation method, when the number of applications and the number of rules for each mobile terminal and application increase, the calculation burden of the rules on the location server is very heavy. In fact, rules have a possible use priority to optimize the calculation process: rules with "hide" actions should have higher priority than rules with "Expose (error)". Therefore, the following rule management and calculation methods can be used.

In the rule management structure of Figure 4a, all rules are stored in 2 hash tables with "mobile device ID + target". According to the act ion in the rule, all the rules Can be divided into "Hide" rules and "Expose" rules.

In the minimum complete coverage rule algorithm illustrated in Figure 4b, all rules are extracted for the target from the hide rule hash, step 401. The purpose of steps 402, 403, and 404 is to check whether the current time and position match the preset rules one by one, and if it matches, execute step 405, that is, stop and return "hide".

When the "hide" rule is no longer left, all rules are extracted from the target from the expose rule hash table, step 406. In step 406, in order to obtain the maximum blur range MaxError, the initial value of the value is set to 0 in advance. In step 407, it is judged whether there is a rule remaining. If not, the position information is exposed by (MaxError) in step 408. In this case, the original (i.e., real) GPS position information is exposed because MaxError = 0. If there are rules remaining, all rules containing matching time periods will be checked to obtain the maximum error range, and when the error value in the rule is greater than MaxError, the current error value is assigned to MaxError, ie steps 409, 410, 411 and 412 Show. The ultimate goal of using such an algorithm is to expose location information with a maximum ambiguity value.

Figure 5 is a block diagram showing the structure of a location server in accordance with one embodiment of the present invention. In accordance with an embodiment of the present invention, location server 102 includes means 506 for receiving GPS location information from a mobile terminal and means 507 for providing said GPS location information to a target application. The location server 102 also includes the following devices:

a user data storage means 501, configured to pre-store at least one rule for the mobile terminal, the at least one rule comprising a condition part and an action part. In a preferred embodiment of the present invention, the rule 'J may be a (target , t ime , reg ion, act ion ) quaternary, where target , t ime , reg ion is a conditional part of the rule 'J, act The ion is the action part, and the actions specified in the action part include hide and expose (error), that is, the position information of the mobile terminal is not exposed, and the position information of the mobile terminal is exposed "blurredly" with the error amount of error. Of course, in the case of error = 0, the real location information of the mobile terminal is exposed. The conditional part may include only one of target, t ime, reg ion, or a combination of any two. a parameter input device 508, which is an interface for inputting current condition parameters. In this example, the condition parameter is an identification target of the target application requesting GPS location information, a current time t ime, and a region or region in which the mobile terminal moves;

- decision request generating means 502, for receiving GPS location information from the mobile terminal, generating a decision request including the GPS location information and condition parameters for providing to the rule calculation means 503;

- Rule calculation means 503, comparing the condition parameters in the decision request with the conditional part of the rules in the user data storage means 501 and generating a decision result; Figure 4b shows an embodiment of a specific calculation process. Of course, other computational methods are also contemplated by those skilled in the art within the basic framework of the present invention;

The decision result execution means 504, if at least one condition parameter matches the condition part, performs the action specified by the action part. The calculation of the rule can be done in a programming language similar to the "if ... then..." conditional control: If ( target is A, t ime is wi thin B and GPS locat ion update in reg ion C ) then act ion D The decision result execution means 504 will perform a specific decision result action. For example, if the result is hide, no GPS location information is sent to the target app.

In conjunction with the workflow shown in Figure 3, in step 301, the mobile terminal transmits the GPS location update to the location server whenever there is a GPS location update from the GPS device. Therefore, the more location update information, the higher the computational cost of the location server. In addition, the more updates are sent to the location server, the larger the amount of data generated by the mobile terminal, and the greater the overhead of the terminal user. Therefore, if the number of GPS location updates issued from the mobile terminal is reduced, the cost of the end user and the location server will be reduced. One of the most straightforward optimizations sends update information to the location server only when the current GPS location leaves the previous location a certain distance (for example, 50 meters or 100 meters).

According to the distributed privacy control structure of the present invention, a part of the "hidden" rule can be provided to the mobile terminal. According to the set "hidden" rule, the mobile terminal does not have to send the GPS location to the location server at all if the "hidden" condition is satisfied. Update, thereby reducing The number of GPS location updates that need to be sent to the location server.

Figure 6 is a diagram showing a rule calculation process performed by a mobile terminal in the privacy control mechanism according to the present invention, in accordance with the present invention.

For example, if the location server supports two apps, Appl and App2, the end user can set the following rules:

( target=Appl, t ime^iondaySa turday, region=(lat=10. 0, lng=10. 0, radius=100. 0) , action=Hide) , and

( target =App2, time= weekend, region: (1 at=10. 0, lng=10. 0, radius=200. 0) , action=Hide) The first rule shows that for Appl, if the time is On Saturday, when the user's moving area is in a circular area with a latitude of 10.0 and a longitude of 1.00 and a radius of 100. 0 meters, it is not necessary to transmit any GPS location update information from the mobile terminal to the location server. The second rule shows that, for the application App2, if the time is on the weekend, when the user's moving area is in a circular area with a latitude of 10. 0, a longitude of 1.0, and a radius of 200. 0 meters, it is not necessary. Any GPS location update information is sent from the mobile terminal to the location server. Incidentally, when the reg ion adopts a rectangle, two points (xl , yl ), ( x2 , y2 ) can be defined.

In step 601, the mobile terminal receives the GPS location update; in step 602, a decision request is sent to the rule computing device, the decision request including GPS location information and at least one condition parameter, in this example, the at least one condition parameter Is the target application identifier, the current time, and the mobile area; in step 603, the rule computing device compares the target application identifier, the current time, and the mobile area included in the decision request with the rules stored in the user data storage device 106; The rule calculation means determines whether the condition parameters match, that is, whether the "Hide" condition is satisfied; if it matches, the mobile terminal does not send the GPS location update to the location server, as shown in step 605. If the condition parameters do not match, the mobile terminal transmits a GPS location to the target application, as shown in step 606. Improvements in the mobile terminal given by the method of the present invention can reduce the number of location update messages and reduce the processing overhead of the location server. Of course, the client software on the mobile terminal must know the "hidden" related rules (for example, by downloading, etc.).

In this embodiment, the GPS-equipped mobile terminal processes some GPS location information "on its own" according to the corresponding rules, that is, selectively hides some GPS information, and the related calculation does not increase the burden on the user terminal. Such a process can significantly reduce the workload of the location server when the number of users in the system and the number of target applications become large. The rule mechanism adopted by the mobile terminal can be similar to the rule mechanism of the location server. Considering the limitations of the terminal device, it is preferable to set a set of hidden rules for the mobile terminal. The hidden rules on the mobile terminal are derived from the selection and derivation of the user's hidden rules stored in the location server.

It is to be noted that the mobile terminal according to the present invention may logically include functional modules similar to those in the location server 102, except that the rule calculation method performed therein is simpler. Therefore, the functional block diagram of the mobile terminal is no longer drawn separately.

Although the invention has been described in connection with the embodiments, the invention is not limited to any embodiments. The scope of the invention is defined by the claims, and includes various alternatives, modifications and equivalents. Therefore, the scope of the invention should be determined by the scope of the appended claims. Further, in the embodiment according to the present invention, the GPS position update information is taken as an example of the position update information, but the present invention is not limited thereto. The privacy protection mechanism of the present invention is applicable to methods and apparatus for processing any type of location information.

Claims

Rights request

A method for processing location information on a location server, the method comprising: receiving location update information from a mobile terminal, and the target application requesting the location update information from the location server, the method further comprising:

Pre-storing at least one rule for the mobile terminal, the at least one rule including a condition part and an action part;

When receiving location update information from the mobile terminal, generating a decision request including the location update information and the at least one condition parameter;

Comparing the at least one condition parameter in the decision request with the condition portion;

If the at least one condition parameter matches the conditional portion, the action specified by the action portion is performed for the target application.

2. The method according to claim 1, wherein the condition part is at least one of an identification, a time period, and a moving area of the target application, and

In a case where the condition part is an identifier of a target application, the at least one condition parameter is an identifier of a target application requesting the location update information from the location server; in a case where the condition part is a time period, The at least one condition parameter is a current time of receiving the location update information from the mobile terminal; and, in a case where the condition part is a mobile area, the at least one condition parameter is a mobile area of the mobile terminal .

3. The method according to claim 1, wherein the condition part is a background of an end user, and the corresponding input parameter is one or more of a current environment, a schedule, an activity, and a user's emotion of the user. item.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein the action portion is to hide or expose the location update information to the target application.

The method according to claim 4, wherein when the action part is exposed to the location update information, an error parameter is further set to follow the error parameter The number adjusts the accuracy of the location information to be exposed and sends it to the target application.

The method according to claim 1 or 2, wherein the location update information is GPS location update information.

A location server for use in a communication network, comprising: means for receiving location update information from a mobile terminal; and means for providing the location update information to the target application, wherein the location server further comprises:

a user data storage device, configured to pre-store at least one rule for the mobile terminal, where the at least one rule includes a condition part and an action part;

a decision request generating means, configured to generate a decision request including the location update information and the at least one condition parameter when receiving the location update information from the mobile terminal;

a rule calculation means, configured to compare the at least one condition parameter in the decision request with the condition part;

a decision result execution device, if the at least one condition parameter and the condition portion

The location server according to claim 7, wherein the condition part is at least one of an identifier, a time period, and a moving area of the target application, and wherein the condition part is an identifier of the target application. In the case, the at least one condition parameter is an identifier of a target application that requests the location update information from the location server; where the condition part is a time period, the at least one condition parameter is from the mobile a current time at which the terminal receives the location update information; and, in a case where the condition portion is a mobile region, the at least one condition parameter is a mobile region of the mobile terminal.

9. The location server according to claim 7, wherein the action portion hides or exposes the location update information to the target application.

10. The location server according to claim 9, wherein when the action portion exposes the location update information, an error parameter is further set to adjust the accuracy of the location information to be exposed according to the error parameter.

11. A method of processing location information on a mobile terminal, comprising receiving from a location device And receiving the location update information and sending the location update information to the location server, where the method further includes:

And when the location update information is received, generating a decision request including the location update information and the at least one condition parameter;

The decision result executing means, if the at least one condition parameter matches the condition part, performs an action specified by the action part for the location server.

The method according to claim 11, wherein the action specified by the action portion is to suppress transmission of the location update information to the location server.

A mobile terminal equipped with a positioning function, comprising: means for receiving location update information from a positioning device; and means for providing the location update information to the location server, wherein the mobile terminal further comprises:

a decision request generating means, configured to generate a decision request including the location update information and the at least one condition parameter when receiving the location update information from the positioning device;

The mobile terminal according to claim 13, wherein the predetermined action of the action portion is to suppress transmission of the GPS location information to the location server.