Passport and ID card

All security features of the identity card

(Holographic Shadow Picture, HSP®):
A second, holographic image of the passport or identity-card holder's photograph becomes visible to the right of the conventional picture when the passport page or the ID card is viewed from a shallow angle. The holographic reproduction process creates a stylised, light-dark image of the ID photograph's pictorial content into which four motifs of the German eagle are incorporated on the left-hand side.

A three-dimensional image of the German eagle in red can be detected from a specific viewing angle.

Kinematic structures are arranged above the conventional photograph; their central element is a German eagle surrounded by twelve stars. When the passport data page or ID card is tilted from left to right, the eagle motif, which is visible at the centre, changes – via a hexagonal structure – into the letter "D". The stars alternately increase and diminish in size. The hexagons above and below the eagle motif move up and down. A chain of stars on the right-hand edge of the picture turns into a "D".


There are kinematic structures on the left edge of the conventional photograph consisting of a curved band of macrolettering with the text "BUNDESREPUBLIK DEUTSCHLAND" (Federal Republic of Germany); several parallel lines of microlettering with the same text connect with the macrolettering on the left-hand side.

When the data page or ID card is tilted, the contrast on the surface of the central eagle motif is reversed, so that the initially light-coloured eagle now appears dark on a light hexagonal surface.


The two machine-readable lines of the data page or ID card are repeated as holograms. These are situated above the conventional machine-readable lines.


The Identigram® has a machine-verifiable structure. This also enables a machine authenticity check to be made to support visual inspection – in addition to the machine-reading of the ID. This structure does not contain any personal or document-related data.

The data page or ID card is embedded into a special laminate. A security embossing process gives the document a tactile relief surface along the right-hand edge. The redesigned embossing contains the letter "D", the German eagle motif, and the words "BUNDESREPUBLIK DEUTSCHLAND" (Federal Republic of Germany) and "REISEPASS" (passport) or "PERSONALAUSWEIS" (ID card).

The following security features remain unchanged:

Guilloches are protective patterns made up of fine, interlacing curved lines in which different-coloured structures fit together perfectly to form a balanced overall picture. In reproductions (e.g. colour copies) the line structures of the original are resolved into dotted halftone structures.

The passport or identity-card holder's family name and first name are laser-engraved into the identification document material at the right-hand edge of the photograph.

When light shines through the paper of the passport data page or ID card, a multitonal watermark can be detected in the form of stylised eagles distributed over the surface.