A method for secure data management in a computer network includes automatically calculating a key from a predetermined number of key fragments of a predetermined length for an encryption of data, encrypting data of a data set to be protected by the calculated key, dividing the data set into a predetermined number of data subsets, wherein the above steps are carried out by at least one processing computer system from a group of processing computer systems, and transmitting the key fragments and the data subsets to a distributed protection system in the computer network, wherein in each case one or more key fragments and in each case one or more data subsets are transmitted respectively from the at least one processing computer system to in each case one entity from a plurality of entities of the distributed protection system in the computer network, and storing all transmitted key fragments and data subsets in the respective entities of the distributed protection system.