Albania is inevitably adamant about becoming a regional leader in using AI. But as with anything, it all comes down to implementation and ensuring democratic values, human rights, and the privacy and integrity of citizen data are upheld.
In December 2023, Prime Minister Edi Rama made waves when he announced that the government would use ChatGPT to speed up its EU integration process and while details have been kept on the down low since the tendrils of AI are making their way into other parts of Albanian governance and society.
ChatGPT is a large AI language model developed by former CTO and current CEO of OpenAI, Mira Murati and her team. It launched in 2022, revolutionising many sectors, including journalism, academia, marketing, science and maths, and politics and policy, while receiving both glowing reviews and widespread condemnation along the way.
Murati, an Albanian born in the southern coastal city of Vlora, not far from where Rama’s mother hails from, is known for avoiding publicity and generally refusing to give comments to the media. But in early December, the prime minister said he had arranged a telephone meeting with Murati where he shared with her a new idea.
“I heard a friendly voice that broke the ice, and I dared to ask her for help to prepare Albania more quickly for EU membership. She laughed and thought I was joking,” he said.
Eventually, Rama said, she agreed, and a joint team was set up between OpenAI and the National Agency for Information Society (AKSHI).
Albania is Europe’s most pro-EU country, with more than 97% favouring membership despite being in the waiting room for 14 years.
Albania applied for EU membership in 2009 and has been an EU candidate country since 2014. Accession negotiations were unblocked after years of delays, mainly due to its progress being tied to that of North Macedonia in the summer of 2022.
Part of the accession process is the mammoth task of translating EU laws into Albanian and then transposing them into local law, ensuring everything is aligned- a process that could take several years to complete.
“Rama said that using ChatGPT would eliminate “an army of translators and a battalion of lawyers, costing millions of euros” and speed up the process.
The prime minister added that on 13 December at the EU summit in Brussels, he would present the project and a successful test of “the Albanian model of artificial intelligence for the interposition of the legislation totaling 280,000 pages of legal measures of the EU.”
But since then, there has been no further public announcement related to the ChatGPT idea, except for the launching of a EUR 2.6 million tender for “Use of Artificial Intelligence in the Process of Transposing the Acquis for European Integration”.
According to the procedure documents, “the general objective of this project is the implementation of AI technology in public institutions to accelerate the process of transposing EU acts. The provision of this service through the use of NLP (Natural Language Processing) capabilities will enable the automation, aggregation, and selection of all acts/laws brought by the EU and access to these codes at any time and from any device by all actors involved in these processes”.
Specifically, according to AKSHI, this automation involves adding AI technology to public institutions for managing requests and providing desired information from EU acts to all platform users throughout the project.
The tender does not mention ChatGPT, OpenAI, or Murati, and questions sent to the company on whether they would still be working with the government on the project remain unanswered.
AI elsewhere
In August 2023, the Albanian government announced it would start using AI to create services that would complement public administration through the e-Albania government services platform. The system uses a virtual operator that draws on AI to provide real-time responses.
Source: freepik.com
Rama also announced that AI will replace a large chunk of services in local and national government, particularly in public procurement, in a bid to crack down on corruption.
“Regardless of how many corrupt individuals will be punished by new justice, corruption will continue to remain a problem until modernisation and the quality of services reaches the extent of transformation. But time has given us the blessing of digital technology and artificial intelligence,” he said.
Describing existing processes as “archaic” and plagued by too many procurement officers and commissioners, he said within this mandate “, We will introduce procurement with AI…because the data will be taken by AI and not by the individual or company, and this will be transparent to everyone.”
As of New Year’s Eve 2023, the platform Virtual Assistant 1.0 was up and running to be “the latest technology solution devised to assist citizens in obtaining public services by streamlining and accelerating interaction with the state and public institutions.”
The government announcement continued that during 2024, Virtual Assistant 2.0 would be up and running- a voice and image-activated chatbot that will independently process and complete the whole application process for every user request for documents and public services.
A collaboration between the national tech agency and Microsoft, it integrates into the digital governance portal e-Albania and is on call 24/7/365.
Rama said, "The application program is a significant example of a new era in which the whole world has entered in and about which we are seeking to do whatever it takes to harness the incredible potential of artificial intelligence.”
Then, in early February, a new law on public procurement passed parliament’s Economy Committee. It relates to a new system which will automatically evaluate bidders on a tender, selecting the winner based on the criteria and the fine print of each bid. It would also automatically exclude operators that do not have a registered ultimate beneficial owner, with previous labour law violations or who do not have a registered beneficial owner, amongst other limitations.
While it is likely there will be more AI integration on the way, the issue of AI ethics is still not addressed.
Concerns on AI
When the ChatGPT-EU idea was announced, some stakeholders sounded the alarm about the danger of implementing such a project with no national AI laws or even strategies in place. The government told BIRN they would use an internationally regulated model and it had reviewed measures regarding the ethical and responsible use of AI.
In comments to the platform, they reiterated it would only be consuming public data and would act as an assistance tool, not a substitute, in a bid to increase productivity and efficiency.
When it comes to translating and transposing laws, the ethical use of AI may not be an issue, but when it comes to other plans in the pipeline, it becomes a necessity.
In the case of AI interacting with citizens and handling personal data, such as with the virtual assistant, the issue of a legal gap becomes more acute, and it is not just digital specialists and civil society activists getting nervous about it.
In January 2024, a group of religious leaders gathered in Tirana at an Artificial Intelligence and Peace meeting. They agreed on the importance of rapid technological developments but said having rules in place to prevent their misuse is crucial.
President of the Episcopal Conference of Albania, Monsignor Angelo Massafra, said having legal frameworks regulating AI and considering human rights, justice, and peace is necessary.
“It will only be possible if we show ourselves capable of acting responsibly and respecting human rights, inclusiveness, transparency, security, individuality, confidentiality and trustworthiness,” he said.
Father Nikolla Petani from the Orthodox community added that technology could also be used to convey messages to believers; in this context, AI can contribute to the benefit of man.
Meanwhile, in February, the European Union member states struck a deal on the AI Act, landmark legislation to bring the fledgeling sector under supervision, laying down rules for its use and implementation across the bloc.
While the final rubber stamp is not expected until at least April, it will fill in many existing grey areas, protecting companies and individuals from misusing their information and data.
But when it comes to Albania, it is something of a chicken and egg situation. The country hopes to use AI to help it join the EU, but concerns about rules remain, while the only comprehensive rules to date are binding on the bloc it hopes to join.
Whether it is ChatGPT, Microsoft, or another unknown bidder, Albania is inevitably adamant about becoming a regional leader in using AI. But as with anything, it all comes down to implementation and ensuring democratic values, human rights, and the privacy and integrity of citizen data are upheld.
The blog was created as part of the “Tales from the Region” initiative led by Res Publica and Institute of Communication Studies, in cooperation with partners from Montenegro (PCNEN), Kosovo (Sbunker), Serbia (Autonomija), Bosnia and Herzegovina (Analiziraj.ba), and Albania (Exit), within the project "Use of facts-based journalism to raise awareness of and counteract disinformation in the North Macedonia media space (Use Facts)" with the support of the British Embassy in Skopje.
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