AKSHI Corruption Scandal | Albania

Summary

In December 2025, Albania’s Special Anti-Corruption Prosecution (SPAK) arrested the leadership of AKSHI — the National Agency for Information Society, the government IT agency responsible for Albania’s entire digital infrastructure. Director General Mirlinda Karçanaj and her Deputy Director Hava Delibashi were placed under house arrest on charges of operating a structured criminal group, tender manipulation, and abuse of office.

The timing is stark: Diella, the world’s first AI minister appointed specifically to fight corruption in public procurement, was built by AKSHI. Karçanaj oversaw Diella’s development. She was arrested three months after Diella’s formal appointment to cabinet.

The Arrests

Investigation Scope

• Investigating body: SPAK (Special Anti-Corruption Structure / Struktura e Posaçme Kundër Korrupsionit dhe Krimit të Organizuar)
• Tenders under investigation: 12 separate procurement procedures
• Duration: Multiple years of alleged systematic manipulation
• BIRN finding: “Capture of AKSHI by criminal interests endangers national security”

AKSHI’s Scope of Control

Understanding why this arrest matters requires understanding what AKSHI actually controls. At the time of the arrests, AKSHI’s leadership oversaw:

• GOVnet: The secure government network connecting 220 Albanian institutions
• AKSHI Data Center: Hosting for 380 government websites
• e-Albania platform: 600+ electronic services for Albanian citizens, including identity documents, civil registry, tax services, and more
• Interoperability Platform: System connecting 30 state databases
• PKI / e-signature infrastructure: Digital signature services for the entire government
• CSIRT: Government cybersecurity operations center
• Diella AI: The AI minister with access to 36,000+ government documents and ~1,000 public services

The people arrested for corruption were also the people with administrative control over Albania’s national identity system, government communications infrastructure, and the AI minister’s data access permissions.

The Irony: Diella vs. AKSHI

Albania built an anti-corruption AI to demonstrate governance reform for EU membership. The agency that built it was, at the time of building it, operating as a criminal enterprise. This is not incidental irony — it is the central fact of Diella’s institutional context.

Timeline

National Security Implications

BIRN (Balkan Investigative Reporting Network) concluded that “the capture of AKSHI by criminal interests endangers national security.” The specific risks identified:

• Data integrity: With criminal actors at the head of AKSHI, what citizen data in e-Albania may have been accessed, modified, or sold?
• Procurement integrity: 12 tender procedures were manipulated. What IT infrastructure was acquired or awarded as a result?
• Diella’s trustworthiness: An AI system built under criminal leadership, with access to 36,000+ documents, raises questions about what data it was trained on and what it can access.
• GOVnet security: The secure government network connecting 220 institutions was administered by the same leadership now under house arrest.
• EU accession: Albania’s EU accession argument partly rested on Diella as evidence of anti-corruption reform. The arrest of Diella’s builders undercuts that narrative entirely.

Sources

• SPAK (Special Anti-Corruption Structure) official announcements, December 2025
• BIRN (Balkan Investigative Reporting Network) reporting on AKSHI arrests
• Tirana Times — AKSHI Director Arrested in Major Corruption Probe
• Albanian media reports, December 2025