CJEU Mandates Change of Registered Gender Identity Upon Request, Citing EU Data Protection Regime

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• An Iranian national granted asylum in Hungary requested that her registered female gender be changed to male, indicating that she is transgender. Her request was denied due to the lack of surgical gender reassignment.​

• The Hungarian court referred the question to the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) to determine whether the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) requires the rectification of registered gender identity data in accordance with a person’s wishes.​

• The CJEU responded affirmatively, stating that while national authorities may require evidence of gender identity disorder, they cannot mandate surgical operations to physically resemble the declared gender.​

• The implications of the CJEU ruling extend beyond the rules for registering asylum seekers and refugees to all public registries in general. This effectively establishes a right to change registered gender identity without surgery across the EU.​

The landmark judgment of the CJEU was issued on March 13, 2025, in Case C-247/23, Deldits.​

What does the CJEU ruling on registered gender identity address?

In 2014, an Iranian national immigrated to Hungary and applied for asylum. She requested to be registered as male, supporting her application with certificates from a psychiatrist and gynecologist confirming her "transsexuality." The asylum authority granted her asylum but registered her according to her biological sex as female.​

In 2022, she applied to correct her registered gender to male and change her name in the asylum registry. The asylum authority denied the request, citing Hungarian law that allows a change of registered gender identity only after surgical correction. She filed a complaint with a Budapest court, arguing that the decision violated her right to respect for private life (Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights and Article 7 of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights) and her right to respect for physical and mental integrity (Article 3 of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights).​

The Budapest court suspended the proceedings and referred questions for a preliminary ruling by the CJEU regarding the interpretation of Article 16 of the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which grants individuals "the right to obtain from the controller without undue delay the rectification of inaccurate personal data concerning him or her."​

The Hungarian court posed three questions:​

1. Is the authority responsible for keeping registers under national law required to rectify the recorded gender identity data of a person if the data has changed after it was entered in the register?​
2. If yes, can the authority require such a person to provide evidence to justify the request?​
3. If yes, must the applicant provide proof of having undergone gender reassignment surgery?​

On March 13, 2025, the CJEU answered the first two questions affirmatively, stating that an authority is obliged to rectify data in accordance with a transgender person’s wishes but may require "relevant and sufficient evidence that may reasonably be required of that person in order to establish that those date are inaccurate." The Court answered the third question negatively, indicating that the authority "may not, under any circumstances, by way of an administrative practice, make the exercise of that right conditional upon the production of evidence of gender reassignment surgery."​

Commentary by the Center for International Law of the Ordo Iuris Institute:

The effect of this CJEU ruling will be that the court will be required to annul the decision of the Hungarian asylum authority and change the individual’s registered gender identity from female to male. The consequences of this ruling, however, extend beyond this particular case and Hungary. The CJEU’s ruling creates a legal framework within the EU under which gender data in official records can be deemed "inaccurate" if a person declares identification with another gender. While formally this applies to public registries, a change in registered gender identity is usually associated with legal consequences affecting a person’s public legal rights and obligations.​

In Poland, for example, this could mean that a biological male declaring himself to be female may be able to retire earlier and avoid compulsory military service in the event of a call to arms or mobilization.​

As a matter of fact, public authorities in all member states may be required to recognize biological females as males and biological males as females, granting them rights and obligations based on their declared gender.​

The only limitation on this freedom for ‘transgender’ individuals is the ability of national authorities to require "relevant and sufficient evidence that may reasonably be required. The Court does not specify what constitutes such evidence, but it may refer to medical certificates confirming a gender identity disorder. However, the Court explicitly ruled out the possibility of requiring transgender individuals to undergo surgery to conform to their identified gender. This means that public authorities will be obliged to treat, for example, a biological male as female, even if there is no physical resemblance to the declared gender.​

The requirement for a doctor’s certificate may not be a sufficient safeguard to prevent abuse of the registered gender identity change procedure. It should be noted that such certificates are sometimes issued based on superficial examinations and largely on the patient’s declaration.​

The CJEU ruling aligns with a general trend in international jurisprudence (including the European Court of Human Rights and the UN Human Rights Committee), which interprets the right to privacy as encompassing the right to change one’s registered gender identity on demand, without conforming to the declared gender. This jurisprudence is legally controversial, misinterpreting the concept of "privacy," but is nonetheless widespread and well-established.​

Further evolution of the jurisprudence of the CJEU and other international bodies toward a free redefinition of one’s ‘gender’ and a EU-wide model of gender reassignment on demand without the need for any medical certification cannot be ruled out.​

This constitutes a further challenge to the sovereignty and democratic systems of EU member states by unelected judges. This case highlights the urgency for a thorough reform of the EU, as advocated by the Ordo Iuris Institute together with European partners.