Can a notarised copy of an FBI background check be apostilled?

No — not in any way that will be useful to you. The US Department of State authenticates the FBI’s own signature and seal on the report the FBI issued. A notary can only attest to their own act, so notarising a photocopy certifies the notary, not the FBI. The document you send must be the FBI-issued report itself.

If you are holding a notarised copy right now, stop before you mail it. The fix is not to undo the notarisation or add a second certificate on top. The fix is to obtain a fresh FBI Identity History Summary and submit that. “FBI background check,” “FBI criminal record check” and “Identity History Summary” are all the same document — Identity History Summary is the FBI’s own name for it, and that is the name you will see printed on the record and on the agency’s instructions.

An apostille certifies a seal, not a story. The Office of Authentications is confirming that the signature on the page belongs to the FBI official whose specimen it holds on file. A notary stamp placed on a photocopy puts a state official’s seal in the way of that check — which is why the notarised version is the wrong document, no matter how neatly it is prepared.

Who actually apostilles an FBI Identity History Summary?

The US Department of State, Office of Authentications, in Washington, DC. That is the only authority in the country that can do it.

The Identity History Summary is a federal record, issued by the FBI’s Criminal Justice Information Services Division. State Secretary of State offices authenticate documents that originate in their own state — notarial acts, state vital records, court records, corporate filings. They have no jurisdiction over a federal agency’s seal. A report mailed to Sacramento, Tallahassee or Albany comes back unprocessed, and you have lost the mailing time in both directions. This is the single most expensive mistake on this document, and it happens constantly because most people’s only previous apostille experience was a state one. If you are unsure which track any other document in your file belongs on, our breakdown of which authority issues the apostille for your document sorts federal from state.

Why does notarising it break the chain?

Authentication works as a chain of recognised officials. Each certificate confirms the one below it. For a federal document the chain is short: the FBI signs and seals the report, and the Department of State certifies that signature. One link.

Put a notary in the middle and you create a different chain entirely. A notarial copy certification is a state act performed under state notary law. The only office that can authenticate a notary’s commission is the Secretary of State of the state that commissioned them — sometimes after a county clerk certification first. Even where that works mechanically, what you end up holding is an apostille that says “this notary was commissioned in this state on this date.” It says nothing about the FBI. When a foreign immigration office, employer or registrar asks for an apostilled police certificate, that is not what they are asking for, and they will say so.

Several states also prohibit notaries from certifying copies of documents that are publicly recordable or obtainable from the issuing agency, which covers records like this one. So in some states the notarisation should never have been performed at all.

Which format does the Office of Authentications accept?

Be precise about what you have, because three things get called “my FBI check”:

• The FBI-issued report — the record produced by the FBI bearing the FBI’s signature and seal. This is the only version that enters the federal authentication chain.
• A channeler’s own output — some FBI-approved channelers return a results summary, a portal screen or a branded PDF that is the channeler’s document, not the FBI’s. Those cannot be authenticated. When you order through a channeler, ask explicitly for the official FBI Identity History Summary with the FBI seal, and check what arrives before you post it.
• A printed copy of an FBI-issued electronic report — the FBI issues electronically as well as on paper, and this is the area where guidance changes and where readers get caught. Confirm the current position on travel.state.gov, or let your filing agent confirm it, before you commit postage. We keep a dedicated page on whether a PDF FBI background check is accepted for apostille.

Do not write on the report, highlight it, staple through the seal, or trim it. Any alteration to an authenticated document gives the receiving authority grounds to refuse it.

What does the federal filing actually require?

Mixing these up is the second most common filing error after the notarised copy. A single envelope cannot go to two authorities. Federal records go to Washington; state records go to the state that issued them.

How do you get an FBI background check apostilled, step by step?

1. Order the report from the FBI first. Request it through the FBI’s electronic Departmental Order portal, by submitting a fingerprint card directly, or through an FBI-approved channeler. Confirm the channeler will return the official FBI-issued summary with the FBI seal.
2. Check what arrived. Look for the FBI seal and the signing official’s name. If what you have is a channeler’s branded summary, a screenshot, or a copy a notary has stamped, the filing will fail before it starts.
3. Confirm the destination’s requirement before anything else gets attached. Apostille or embassy legalisation, English or translated, consulate-in-the-US or in-country — all of that is set by the receiving authority, and some of it determines the order of the remaining steps.
4. Complete Form DS-4194. The Department of State’s Request for Authentications Service must name the country where the document will be used. Leave that field blank or wrong and the request is not processed.
5. Submit to the Office of Authentications. Mailed requests go with the document, the payment in an accepted form, and a self-addressed prepaid return envelope. State publishes more than one mailing address, chosen by how soon you travel — read the current page rather than reusing an address from an old thread.
6. Handle translation or legalisation last, unless the destination says otherwise. For Hague Convention destinations the apostille is the end of the US-side process. For non-member destinations, the authenticated report then goes to that country’s embassy or consulate in the US for legalisation.

Reverse any of these and you pay twice. Translate before the apostille where the consulate wanted the apostille translated too, and the translation is incomplete. Apostille before confirming the destination, and you may hold a certificate naming the wrong country. Order the report months early to “get it out of the way,” and it can age past the destination’s window while your visa file sits in a queue.

How recent does the report have to be?

No US authority expires it. The FBI does not stamp a validity period on the Identity History Summary, and the apostille itself does not lapse. The clock is entirely the destination’s, and it almost always runs from the FBI’s issue date — not from the date the apostille was attached.

That distinction matters because every stage in between consumes the window: fingerprinting, FBI processing, federal authentication, translation, and the consular or in-country appointment queue. Readers constantly assume the apostille resets the clock. It does not. Ask the receiving authority how old the report may be on the day they receive it, then work backwards. If the record is being used for an immigration renewal rather than a first application, the window is often tighter — see our notes on using a US police certificate for a residence permit renewal.

Do you need a translation as well as an apostille?

Often, yes — and the rule belongs to the destination, not to the US. English-language jurisdictions generally take the report as issued. Many civil-law countries maintain registers of sworn or court-appointed translators and will only accept a translation produced by one of them, frequently a translator registered in that country rather than in the US. Others accept a US translator’s signed certificate of accuracy.

Two questions decide your sequence, and you must ask both: does the translation need to be produced before or after the apostille, and does the translation itself need to be certified or legalised separately? Get a written answer from the consulate or the receiving office. Requirements vary by jurisdiction and the receiving authority has the final say on what it accepts.

What about non-Hague destinations?

If the destination is a party to the Hague Apostille Convention, the federal apostille completes the US side. If it is not, the Department of State issues an authentication certificate instead, and that document then goes to the destination’s embassy or consulate in the US for legalisation — occasionally followed by a ministry step after arrival. Convention membership and entry-into-force dates change, so check the current status on the HCCH status table rather than relying on a list in a blog post, including ours.

Do you need several copies for several countries?

Yes, if you are filing in more than one place. The authentication request names a single country of use, and the certificate is issued accordingly. You cannot peel an apostille off and reuse it, and the Department of State will not reissue it for a different country without a fresh request. Plan one FBI-issued report per destination, ordered at the same time so the issue dates stay close together. The Department of State also caps how many documents it will accept at an in-person drop-off and how many drop-offs you may make in a day — check the current limits if you are filing a stack.

Common reasons an apostille request is rejected

• A notarised photocopy submitted instead of the FBI-issued report. The subject of this page, and the most common single cause.
• Sent to a state Secretary of State. No state office can authenticate a federal seal; the envelope comes back.
• A channeler’s own summary rather than the FBI’s record. No FBI seal, nothing to authenticate.
• Country of use missing or wrong on Form DS-4194. The request is not processed, and a wrong country means a certificate you cannot use.
• No prepaid return envelope, or payment in a form the Department of State does not accept by mail. Cash and card details must never be mailed.
• Fingerprints rejected for quality. The FBI returns a rejection notice and you resubmit through the same channel — rolled prints taken by an inexperienced technician are the usual culprit. Check the FBI’s current resubmission rules before reordering.
• Name on the report does not match the passport. The summary reflects the identifiers you submitted. If you have married, changed your name, or use a different transliteration, expect the receiving authority to query it and be ready with the supporting record — which may itself need its own apostille.
• The report aged out while the file was in a queue. Recency is measured by the destination, from the FBI issue date.
• Non-Hague destination and embassy legalisation skipped. An authentication certificate alone is not the end of that chain.
• No usable US return address. If you are already overseas, the return leg is its own problem — see what a missing US address blocks in an apostille filing.
• The document was altered. Highlighting, hole-punching, stapling through the seal or trimming the page all invite refusal.

What we do and what remains the destination’s call

We prepare and file the federal authentication on the FBI-issued report: form completion with the correct country of use, correct routing to the Office of Authentications, and tracked return. Our price is $120 per apostille, all-inclusive — no separate government-fee surcharge and no per-page add-ons. The issuing agency’s filing fee is already inside that price, which is why you will not see it quoted separately anywhere on this page. We are a private filing service and are not affiliated with the FBI, any channeler, or the Department of State.

What we can control is the US side: the right document, the right form, the right office. Whether a foreign ministry, employer or registrar accepts the finished certificate on the day you hand it over is their decision, governed by their own rules on age, translation and supporting evidence — so confirm those with them before you order. If you are assembling a wider file rather than a single record, our guide to which documents need an apostille when you retire abroad maps the usual set.

Next step: look at the report in your hand. If it carries the FBI’s signature and seal and has not been notarised, written on, or altered, it is ready to file — start an order and tell us the country it is going to, and we will take the federal filing from there. If it is a notarised copy or a channeler’s summary, order a fresh FBI Identity History Summary first; nothing else will clear the Office of Authentications.