Authentications

Type of Certification

Depending upon the country where the document is being used, determine if you will need a Certificate of Apostille, or Authentication/Authority. Then click on the link on the right to find the process for obtaining that certificate.

Copies of the Same Document

Adopting a child from another country requires that some documents are duplicated. For example, you may need to get two or three birth certificates for each of the adopting parents and all need to be authenticated.

The authentication fee on original duplicate documents for adoptions is $5. For example, you need three copies of the father’s birth certificate. The first original is $10 and the other two originals are $5 each. The documents must be submitted at the same time to qualify for the reduced duplicate fee.

Emergencies

Emergencies can happen. Review the link on the left for "Turn Around Times." There is an option for same or next day documents if you can bring them into the office in Raleigh.

Browse Authentications

In this section, we will focus on the series of box image links under the Browse Authentications section of the main Authentications page. You can find an overview of this section in Authentications.

In this section of the manual, we will discuss each topic represented in the links.