A database comprising biometric data stored in encrypted form is managed by a management unit. It comprises a set of filters respectively associated with filter identifiers. A biometric data item is received at a management unit; next, said biometric data item is stored in an encrypted form at a given address in the database. Then keywords are obtained on the basis of a first set of hash functions and of the biometric data item. A subset of indexing filters is associated with each keyword by selecting, for each keyword, filters as a function of the respectively associated filter identifiers, of said keywords, and of a second set of hash functions; and the given address is associated with each of the filters of the subset of filters.