NEW IMPROVEMENTS TO CONSULAR REPORT AT BIRTH ABROAD CERTIFICATES
The Department of State has redesigned the Consular Report of Birth Abroad (CRBA) to make the documents more secure and highly difficult to forge. CRBA is an official system of recording overseas births of children to a US citizen parent. These children automatically get US citizenship.
CRBAs were first introduced in 1919 and have been printed at US embassies and consulates ever since. Now, as of January 3, 2011, the production of CRBAs will become centralized – they will be printed in facilities in Portsmouth, NH and New Orleans, LA. By centralizing production of CRBAs, the Department of State hopes to significantly reduce the threat of fraudulent CRBAs and instill uniform quality.
In addition to centralizing production, changes will be made to the CRBAs themselves. Instead of using the title of “father” and “mother,” as was the case prior to January 3rd, they will now use the title of “parent” in order to “provide a gender neutral description of a child’s parents and in recognition of different types of families.”
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