KYC stands for “Know Your Customer” and describes the identity check every licensed crypto exchange carries out before your first purchase. You provide your name, date of birth, place of birth, nationality and residential address, and the exchange matches these details against an official ID document. In Germany, no provider may open an account for you without this check, not even if you only want to swap 20 euros into Bitcoin.

The obligation comes from the German Anti-Money Laundering Act (Geldwäschegesetz, GwG). Since the European crypto regulation MiCA took effect, the act explicitly names crypto-asset service providers as obliged entities, putting them on a par with banks, payment institutions and investment firms. In practice,…