Adoption Changes from Past to Present Several changes have been made regarding adoption practices. In years past, confidentiality played an important aspect in adoption. Recently, a growing number of people have returned to adoption agencies in search of information on birth families. This conflict has created a debate concerning whether or not adopted children should have the right to know who their birth parents are. The actual adoption procedures vary from state to state. At first, in order to protect the privacy of the birth parents and adopted child, adoption records in most s