Patent ID: 8259951

Claim:
A storage system, comprising: a disk storage device; a tape storage device in which a tape storage medium can be loaded; and a controller for controlling the disk storage device and the tape storage device, wherein: the controller includes a first interface coupled to a network, at least a second interface coupled to the disk storage device and the tape storage device, a processor coupled to the first interface and the second interface, and a memory coupled to the processor; and the controller is configured to: generate, upon reception of a request for setting a tape group including one or more tape storage media, a first encryption key used for encrypting data to be stored in the tape group set by the request; and hold information for correlating the generated first encryption key with the tape group, and wherein the tape group includes a plurality of the tape storage media, and wherein the controller is configured to: control, upon reception of a request for backing up data stored in the disk storage device in the tape group, the tape storage device to encrypt the data stored in the disk storage device by using the first encryption key correlated with the tape group; control the tape storage device to store the encrypted data, information for identifying the tape group, and information for identifying the first encryption key in the plurality of tape storage media included in the tape group; control, upon reception of a request for restoring the data stored in the tape group in the disk storage device, the tape storage device to read data from the plurality of tape storage media included in the tape group; control the tape storage device to decrypt the read data by using the first encryption key correlated with the tape group; store the decrypted data in the disk storage device; receive a request for backing up the first encryption key and a password; generate a second encryption key based on the password; encrypt the first encryption key by using the second encryption key; and output the encrypted first encryption key.