Der Tagesspiegel: Thousands of the Immigration Office staff in Germany can manipulate asylum files

The German newspaper «Der Tagesspiegel» report revealed that thousands of the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees staff in Germany can theoretically manipulate asylum files due to the security vulnerability at the electronic file system known as «Maris».

The German newspaper Der Tagesspiegel reported Friday that this finding was made clear through an internal audit of the office for its audit report for 2018.

The auditors found that about 50% of all staff in the office can make changes to files within the Maris system on a large scale.

«In practice, it is possible to abuse this right», the report said.

The report pointed out that it is also possible through this gap to cancel the hearings of asylum applicants, to be replaced by questionnaire forms.

According to Der Tagesspiegel, this broad right to access asylum files was limited to a small number of employees, but it has already become available to 3800 employees to date.

According to the report, the proportion of those entitled to use the system «Maris» in some offices of the Federal Office currently to 85%.

In the view of the auditors that the former director of the branch of the Office in Bremen also manipulated the files through this method.

It should be noted that the German prosecutor is conducting investigations against the former director of the office in Bremen on charges of bribery and granting asylum in violation of the law.

Investigations also include other staff, an interpreter and lawyers.

The interpreter was suspected of receiving money from asylum-seekers.

According to the prosecution’s data, the Bremen branch is suspected of illegally granting asylum to at least 1200 people between 2013 and 2016.