At least 69 detained and 25 investigated for selling alien appointments: the criminal gang used bots and collaborated with lawyers

The National Police has dismantled a framework that blocked the online dating system for foreigners through a computer bot. The criminals made available appointments to resell them, despite being a free process.

Foreign citizens who wished to request an appointment were forced to contact the owners or intermediaries of the Bots due to the lack of appointments offered. In exchange, the criminal network asked for financial compensation of between 30 and 200 euros.

The investigation, carried out by agents specialized in cybercrime, has allowed the identification of 94 people allegedly involved in the criminal organization. Of these, 69 have been arrested and another 25 investigated.

The Bot had the ability to bypass the security mechanisms installed on the website for online appointment requests. The leaders of the organization instructed the intermediaries to use VPN connections that allowed them to hide the IP address from where they operated, thus having the possibility of accessing a greater number of appointments.

Those arrested rented the bot to get immigration appointments throughout the national territory. In addition, they had a large number of brokers who had received large amounts of money for trading with the bot.

Among the intermediaries are lawyers, managers and advisors who were aware of the existence of computer damage against the official dating website, but who, due to their vulnerable situation, agreed to collaborate with the criminal gang.

The bot detected the moment in which appointments were available in the different provinces and appropriated them by having the data preloaded and being programmed 24 hours a day, controlling the release of appointments.

The investigation

The agents specialized in cybercrime prepared a report with investigations carried out by the Provincial Immigration Brigades of Spain after detecting certain problems when accessing the system to make an appointment.

In the first phase, the police investigations led to the criminal network, which used a computer bot, based on carrying out repetitive, predefined and automated tasks, to obtain practically all the available appointments.

In a second phase, developed in Alicante and Cáceres, the agents identified two people responsible for obtaining massive appointments. The police managed to enter the Alicante home of one of those investigated. In the registry, a computer was intervened in which there were several open windows connected to the appointment page of the electronic office of foreigners. In another window was a spreadsheet that was being modified automatically or remotely.

After the first two operational operations, the agents of UCRIF Central and in collaboration with various Provincial Brigades managed to identify and arrest at least 69 people from the organization throughout Spain.. Those arrested have been accused of crimes of belonging to a criminal organization and computer damage. In Madrid and Cádiz there are still 25 investigated who have not been arrested.