Patent ID: 8711006

Claim:
A vehicle detection apparatus using a magnetic sensor, comprising: a communication unit for receiving information about movement of a reference vehicle from a central management center; a magnetic sensing unit for sensing a change in a magnetic field attributable to movement of vehicles, and generating a magnetic signal based on the change in the magnetic field; a calibration information generation unit for generating calibration information by using the information about the movement of the reference vehicle and the change in the magnetic signal attributable to the movement of the reference vehicle; a vehicle detection unit for calibrating a change in a magnetic signal attributable to movement of an actual vehicle, the magnetic signal being generated by the magnetic sensing unit, based on the calibration information generated by the calibration information generation unit, and detecting the movement of the actual vehicle by analyzing the calibrated change in the magnetic signal; and a control unit for controlling the communication unit, the calibration information generation unit and the vehicle detection unit, and setting mode to one of a calibration information generation mode for generating the calibration information and a vehicle detection mode for detecting the movement of the actual vehicle.