Endless Forms to Fill Out
January 21, 2007
To a foreign eye, German civil authorities are extremely interested in what the people living in their town are up to. Getting married? There's a form to fill out. Had a child? There's a different form. Moving house? That's a third form. Interested in changing your name or sex? Press firmly, this form is being filled out in triplicate.
While those living in Germany often realize -- or are informed of -- what and when they need to make the trip to city hall to register with local authorities, the information demanded by civil servants can differ depending on which of the country's 5,238 registration offices is responsible.
That a man who lived happily with a pseudonym in North Rhine-Westphalia has to fess up and register it when he finds a new apartment across the state border in Rhineland-Palatinate is a situation the federal government would like to change by introducing a unified system across all of Germany by 2008.
Simple and uniform
"We want to make things easier for citizens," Deputy Interior Minister Johann Hahlen told daily Süddeutsche Zeitung on Thursday. "Citizens should give the same information nationwide, not different information in different places."
A central federal register would also make it easier for residents to find out exactly what the government agencies knows about them by going to a single office, Hahlen added. Currently a resident would have ask each of the more than 40 authorities permitted to access portions of the information what personal details they have on file.
"Citizens should know which office saves what information," Hahlen said.
Though the details of the new plan have not been announced, it would allow people to see which authorities know what by visiting a single office, Hahlen said. He added that government agencies would be forbidden from accessing more information than they need for their work or sharing their data with others.
Additionally, organizers said they hope the central register will cut down on the problem of non-existent records and double records. There are some 3.2 million extra records for people regarded as residents although they no longer live in the country or are incorrectly registered in multiple places, according to official estimates reported in the Süddeutsche Zeitung.
Cutting down on what's saved
Privacy rights advocates told the Munich-based daily they wanted to make sure the proposed federal register adhered to current privacy laws and gathered only relevant information.
"Why does someone need to know if you have a gun license when you register your address?" German Federal Data Protection Commissioner Peter Schaar told the paper. "There is a lot of excess (information), and that needs to be severely reduced."
The Interior Ministry intends to discuss what and how the new system stores information with privacy groups, Hahlen said.
"We want to keep the current level of protection," he added. "If we do a messy job here, we'll gamble away the people's trust."