A number of foreign nationals have received official-looking letters lately, telling them they must leave Switzerland by the end of the year.
As Swiss media reported, these letters, allegedly from the State Secretariat for Migration (SEM), inform the recipients that they must leave the country by December 31st, 2026 – the date on which their residency permits will be automatically revoked.
The reason for this move, the letter explained, is the immigration-curbing ‘No to 10 million’ initiative to take place on June 14th.
But though it closely resembles the SEM letterhead, the migration authority said the letter is fake and “has no impact on the residency status of the recipients.”
Recurring attempts
In fact, SEM pointed out that different versions of this letter had already circulated in Switzerland in the past.
In 2024, for instance, a similarly-worded one informed foreign recipients that the free movement agreement between Switzerland and the EU had been nullified, and therefore “your residence permit is no longer valid.”
At that time too, SEM responded that the letter is fake, advising recipients to ignore it and, above all, not to click on the QR code on the top.
‘Attempt at fraud’
And the year before, many foreigners had received emails from addresses swissimmigration@consultant or eu_immigration@consultant, which also pretended to be from he Swiss immigration authority.
“In most cases, a fictitious job in the hotel industry is offered, with the senders demanding payment of 300 to 1,000 euros for a permit in Switzerland and for health and accident insurance,” SEM reported at the time.
The first clue that this email didn’t come from SEM, which is part of Switzerland’s government, is that it asked for payment in euros. If the scammers were smarter, they’d demand Swiss francs.
“These e-mails do not come from the SEM and should be considered as an attempt at fraud,” the agency said.
There had been similar extortion attempts as well.
Foreigners received emails coming allegedly not only from SEM, but also from Swiss border control authorities, or even the Federal Office of Police (Fedpol).
They all threatened to revoke the victim’s residence permit or even expel them from the country altogether if they didn’t pay a certain sum of money into an anonymous account.
Needless to say, no government authority would ever resort to blackmail or demand payment for such ‘services’.
So a good rule to remember (for foreigners and Swiss alike) is that if threats and pressure are involved, letters / emails / phone calls / WhatsUp messages are more than likely scams.
