I actually looked into this, apparently its popular across western Europe (not just Germany) and a relic of historical times when the states didn't have centralized birth and death registries. I believe the limited validity and Apostille requirement is a medieval method to combat fraud.
As a new world Australian, the fact this remains in force is completely insane. In Australia the authorities can trivially query the birth and deaths register to verify the validity of certificates.
In Germanys defense, centralized registries were used by the Nazi regime to facilitate the Holocaust.
Anyway Biometric passports/ids pretty much completely supersede this use-case and can be as equally decentralized.
> Anyway Biometric passports/ids pretty much completely supersede this use-case and can be as equally decentralized.
Those are already in place in France, but some administrations still ask for a paper original (or scan of original) of your birth certificate. However some others have implemented some government-backed scheme where it automatically fetches your birth records from a government source (idk how it works behind the scenes) and it just works.
It was the same with a proof of where you live, it had to a be a bill in your name for electricity or something similar, but now it can just query popular sources such as the main electricity provider and just work.
As a new world Australian, the fact this remains in force is completely insane. In Australia the authorities can trivially query the birth and deaths register to verify the validity of certificates.
In Germanys defense, centralized registries were used by the Nazi regime to facilitate the Holocaust.
Anyway Biometric passports/ids pretty much completely supersede this use-case and can be as equally decentralized.