Robust TDOA Localization under Sparse NLOS via Geman-McClure with Balance Parameter

Time Difference of Arrival (TDOA) positioning technology is widely used in fields such as navigation, radar and the internet of things. However, Non-Line-of-Sight (NLOS) effects significantly degrade positioning accuracy. In particular, when the reference receiver experiences NLOS errors, these errors may contaminate all TDOA measurements, exacerbating the overall positioning error. To address this issue, this paper proposes a robust TDOA positioning method. Specifically, this method introduces a balance parameter to attenuate NLOS errors from the reference receiver and uses the Geman-McClure loss function to weigh NLOS noise in non-reference paths, thereby effectively mitigating the impact of sparse NLOS errors. Numerical experimental results indicate that when the signal propagation path of the reference receiver is NLOS, the proposed algorithm significantly improves localization accuracy compared to traditional methods.