The invention relates to a method for authenticating a radio communication network vis-a-vis a mobile station. In such a method, batches of authentication vectors that each contain an authentication token with a pertaining sequence number are generated on the network side. At the mobile station side an identity module of the mobile station decides whether a sequence number contained in a previously selected authentication vector is accepted for authentication or rejected. The identity module is informed by the radio communication network which authentication tokens with the pertaining sequence numbers are present in the same batch. One sequence number per batch is stored by the identity module and is used to decide whether the sequence number received is accepted or rejected.