if they do not notify you automatically, can you ask them? are they obligated in law to disclose these records on demand?
Something tells me they'd simply decide to have an active investigation on everyone from birth to death and simply decline all requests due to "ongoing investigation".
> if they do not notify you automatically, can you ask them? are they obligated in law to disclose these records on demand?
No, of course not. What the German secret services do is mostly, well, secret. One of our ministers for inner affairs said once the following in an interview as an answer to some questions about what the agencies know: "Ein Teil dieser Antworten würde die Bevölkerung verunsichern."¹
It's actually even difficult to get to know what the normal police knows about you. But there they at least have to disclosure such information if you ask as long as there is no open investigation.
> Something tells me they'd simply decide to have an active investigation on everyone from birth to death and simply decline all requests due to "ongoing investigation".
The German agencies don't have the capacity for such thing at the moment. I guess they really would like to have some data-centers like the NSA, but they don't have them currently.
"Physical" surveillance is expensive and needs people. They also need usually some "real reasons" (like you're anti-government and you reach a lot of people online) to spy on you.
What's expanding is digital mass surveillance—as it's considerably cheap. But that's a problem not only in Germany I guess…
At least on paper they can't investigate against any random people. Germany is still considered a nation of law.
They need to report to that panel on secret service affairs in parliament I've mentioned, and there are laws in place for what they are allowed to look for (even you could construct something arbitrary at any time against anybody as we saw in the past; if someone needs a reason for an investigation they will find one for sure).
On the other hands side, as I said, as nobody can really control what they're doing hell knows what kind of data they collect. If someone (like a board of inquiry after some scandal) asks to much questions and wants to look into things they would shred the records likely again, and every involved person "couldn't remember" anything (that last thing is a common trope before parliamentarian boards of inquiry anyway).
Something tells me they'd simply decide to have an active investigation on everyone from birth to death and simply decline all requests due to "ongoing investigation".