A communication method and an apparatus are provided herein. The method includes: sending, by a mobility management entity (MME), a track area update (TAU) accept message to a user equipment (UE), the TAU accept message comprising an identifier constructed from at least a resource pool identifier (pool-ID) that identifies a resource pool in a public land mobile network (PLMN), a mobility management entity identifier (MME-ID) that uniquely identifies the MME within the resource pool, and a UE temporary identifier that uniquely identifies the UE within the MME; and receiving, by the MME, a TAU complete message from the UE.