Overview
- The Senate’s reply to a CDU query says suspected cases of abusive paternity acknowledgements are not recorded and no dark‑figure estimate exists.
- City registry and youth offices documented 4,741 paternity acknowledgements by mid‑October 2025, compared with 5,871 in all of 2024.
- CDU legislator Julian Hermann criticises the absence of systematic tracking of multiple acknowledgements, lack of review or block markers, and missing cross‑state coordination.
- Under current rules, immigration authorities are generally not involved in recognition procedures, and registry offices must record paternity even when biological parenthood is doubtful.
- Hamburg notes it helped design a federal bill to curb abuse that stalled after the coalition collapse, and says the Interior Authority continues to push for national reform.