Spanish police have arrested 69 people allegedly connected to a criminal gang that hacked an online booking system for police appointments and resold the sessions to asylum seekers and other foreigners seeking residency.
Police said the gang's automated software application - or bot - was able to bypass measures designed to identify robots, allowing it to book "practically all" of the appointments across Spain that are normally free and resell them for as much as 200 euros ($220) each.
In Spain, people seeking asylum or a residency visas must present documents to the police, for which long waits are common.
