Adoption – Applying to inspect files

If you would like to view the placement files:

You must

• have been adopted and are at least 16 years old, or
• an adoptive parent and your adopted child, whose records you wish to view, is not yet 16 years old.

If you wish to view the data at the registry office:

The following persons may inspect the civil status register at the registry office:

• the adoptive parents,
• their parents,
• the child’s legal representative, and
• the child themselves, provided they are at least 16 years old.

This restriction ceases to apply upon the child’s death.

Following the child’s death, the following persons may inspect the civil status register:

• persons to whom the register entry relates and
• their spouses, civil partners, ascendants and descendants.

Other persons have a right of access if they can demonstrate a legitimate interest. In the case of the birth or death register, demonstrating a legitimate interest is sufficient if the application is made by a sibling of the child or the deceased. Persons aged 16 or over are entitled to make an application.

If paternity has been acknowledged despite existing paternity, information from, and access to, the results of a genetic paternity test included in the collective files may only be granted to the person acknowledging paternity, the mother, the child and the other man whose consent is required under Section 1595a of the Civil Code (BGB) is required.