A joint investigation by German media outlets Stern and RTL published this week revealed that fake German language and integration certificates were being sold online, specifically through social media platforms like TikTok.
The fake documents, which are said to cost around €1,500, could theoretically be used in applications for German citizenship or permanent residency.
The idea that foreigners could be using forged certificates to achieve residency and/or citizenship in Germany has naturally resulted in a media frenzy and invited backlash and criticism from some politicians.
Of course, the story is also great fodder for anti-immigration narratives, as it appears to be the perfect example of immigrants cheating the system rather than making earnest efforts to integrate and respect the law.
But how big is the problem of fake certificates really?
What can be found online?
The RTL report highlights videos found on TikTok advertising German language certificates for "Without school and without testing".
One example, found by The Local, shows what appears to be a TELC (Germany's largest language test provider) language certificate on a table. Overlaid text simply reads, "Deutschlandweit verfügbar: A1, A2, B1, B2, C1, C2." (Available throughout Germany.)
The account has posted three videos in total - all with similar messages.
If you search for terms like "German language certificates," similar posts can be found mixed throughout the results.
The majority of posts on the topic, however, are videos of foreigners who live in Germany explaining how they studied the language in order to pass the exam in a given number of months or years.
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Journalists at RTL and Stern verified the availability of these certificates by successfully purchasing them in three German cities between July and August. They noted that dealers often communicated through WhatsApp and that payment was made during the handover.
While the recent investigation has brought this issue into the limelight, the existence of forged documents is not a strictly new phenomenon. Searching similar terms on Facebook, The Local found pages that appeared to offer similar services - such as this one from 2023.
What are the numbers?
Media reports have struck an arguably sensational tone: "Gigantic scam," "alarming dimensions," and "huge fraud" are among the phrases that can be found in German language stories on the topic.
But virtually all of the recent reports are based on the Stern/RTL research, which doesn't include much in the way of hard figures. In fact, Stern's report notes that authorities in the German states "cannot provide statistics on the number of cases of fraud."
Lacking hard numbers on the use of forgeries, RTL instead cites the number of applications for naturalisation that were withdrawn, which was 1,009 in the past five years including 270 so far in 2025, according to the Federal Office of Administration.
But applications for naturalisation are withdrawn for a number of reasons, and the recent investigation doesn't offer any evidence suggesting that a significant portion of these withdrawals are related to fraud. To this point, Stern's report says: "It is not recorded whether the revocation of naturalisation was due to forged certificates."
Citing a query to various police forces in Germany RTL writes that "cities such as Hamburg and Frankfurt report a mid-double-digit number of current investigations."
They add that police insiders from "various federal states report ongoing investigations, some of which are said to contain more than 1,000 suspected cases."
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Investigations can be expected to continue for some time, so it could be months or even years before more concrete figures become known.
What can be said now is that if it were to be found that fraudulent documents were used in some one- to two-thousand applications for citizenship last year, that would still amount to less than one percent of the 291,955 naturalisations granted.
What's being said?
Widespread or not, conservative and right-wing leaders who have long been critical of the easing of Germany's naturalisation rules, can be expected to point to this investigation as an example of why rules need to be tightened.
Reacting to the investigation, Alexander Throm, spokesman for domestic policy for the conservative CDU/CSU parliamentary group told Welt: "I expect the immigration authorities to review these cases again..."
He added that he meant both in terms of naturalization and for residence permits.
Meanwhile Filiz Polat, parliamentary secretary for the Green Party in the Bundestag, opposed a retrospective review.
Polat told Focus that people wishing to become naturalized should not be placed under general suspicion, adding that "prevention through future-proof, forgery-proof procedures" was needed instead.
READ ALSO: When can your German citizenship be revoked?
As The Local has reported, unlawful naturalisations can be revoked for up to ten years. This means that anyone caught using forged documents or lying on their citizenship application could have their German passport withdrawn.
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