A legal commentary published on 20 July has placed a spotlight on an emerging—and risky—workaround for Spain’s notorious shortage of immigration appointments. According to M. Eugenia Blasco Rodellar of AGM Abogados, desperate applicants are now being asked by unregulated intermediaries to hand over their personal digital certificates in exchange for a booking at Extranjería or Police offices. The certificates, issued by Spain’s Fábrica Nacional de Moneda y Timbre, allow full electronic identification and the signing of official documents. Losing control of them is equivalent to giving a stranger power-of-attorney online. The National Cyber-Security Institute warns that stolen certificates have already been used to obtain tax data, social-security histories and even unemployment benefits in the victim’s name. For employers moving foreign talent into Spain, the development raises red flags. Staff who surrender their certificates may unknowingly expose payroll data, medical insurance details and company contracts stored in government portals. HR and mobility teams should update onboarding briefings: no reputable gestoría or law firm will ever request the original.pfx file or private key; at most they will guide the employee through a proxy signing session. The article also urges the administration to tackle the root cause: the impossibility of securing appointments for fingerprints or residence-card renewals. Proposals include automatically assigning a slot when an application is approved and imposing stricter controls on bots that hoard appointments. Until systemic fixes arrive, companies should plan renewals at least four months in advance and consider using regional offices with shorter queues. Blasco’s warning comes as Madrid’s main Extranjería office shows available biometric slots only in late October, while Barcelona’s online calendar remains blank. The market for illicit appointments—now reportedly worth €300 per slot—is unlikely to disappear without a major increase in administrative capacity.
Source: Cinco Días
