Eduardo González
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has already received authorization from the General Directorate of Legal Security and Public Faith, under the Ministry of the Presidency, Justice, and Parliamentary Relations, to deploy DICIREG in nearly twenty Consular Offices, bringing the number of Consulates that already have this new digital Civil Registry platform to almost 120.
The rollout of DICIREG abroad began in July 2024 in the Spanish consular offices in Helsinki, Manchester, and Amman and is expected to be completed by mid-2024 throughout the entire Spanish consular network. The implementation of DICIREG abroad is being carried out progressively in close coordination between the Ministries of Foreign Affairs and the Presidency and is occurring in parallel with its rollout in Spain.
On December 23, the Foreign Affairs Ministry reported in a press release that the platform had already been deployed in 35 consulates. Since then, the Official State Gazette (BOE) has reported its implementation in another 80 consular offices in countries as significant as the United States, Germany, and China. Therefore, the platform has already been deployed in a quarter of Spain’s more than 440 consulates worldwide.
On April 25 and 26 alone, the BOE announced the effective implementation of the DICIREG software application in 17 consular offices: Belgrade, Maputo, Prague, Skopje, Tripoli, Ljubljana, Warsaw, Valletta, Cairo, and Budapest (where it will begin operating on May 12), Yaoundé, Niamey, Lagos, Dakar, Abuja, and Libreville (starting on May 19), and Bratislava (starting on June 23).
DICIREG, the digital platform adapted to the new Civil Registry model provided for in the 2011 Civil Registry Law, is a comprehensive application in which both the processing of files and the subsequent registration of events are carried out electronically. It is also based on an individual registry, through which each person is identified by their personal code, which attests to the facts and acts of their civil status, arranged chronologically and systematically.
According to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the advantages of implementing DICIREG in Consular Offices are “numerous for Spanish citizens abroad,” as it allows them to obtain any civil registry certificate electronically without having to travel to Consular Offices, which are sometimes far from their place of residence.
Furthermore, by organizing the publication of registry information in digital format, citizens can access the registry online using their electronic identification. All of this promotes immediacy and legal security, since the certificates are transmitted immediately and, as they are issued digitally with a Secure Verification Code (CSV), their authenticity is guaranteed.
“DICIREG, together with the implementation of the Consular Digitalization Plan, will contribute to a new relationship between Spanish citizens abroad and their corresponding Consular Offices, characterized by electronic accessibility and more agile and simplified processing,” the Ministry of Foreign Affairs emphasized last December.
