The importance of the cryptographic key management system for the cybersecurity of the ERTMS system

The ERTMS system is intended to provide an interoperable approach to train control and signalling in the European Union. The basis for effective train control at ETCS Level 2 is wireless data transmission via GSM-R. This transmission must be protected by cryptographic techniques to ensure its safety. The authors in their article present technical solutions and their applications related to cryptographic keys. They present the requirements that have been formulated for the cryptographic key management system. They discuss its architecture, functions and possibilities of increasing the security of management processes with the use of solutions applied in other branches of the economy. In the last point of the article attention is drawn to the threats posted by the complex process of managing a set of cryptographic keys, the number of which can be measured by tens of thousands.