Editing Telecommunications in Albania (section)

==History==
Until 1990, [[Albania]] was extremely isolated and controlled, and installation and maintenance of a modern system of international and domestic telecommunications was precluded.<ref name=":0">{{citation-attribution|1={{cite encyclopedia|title=Albania: a country study|publisher=[[Federal Research Division]], [[Library of Congress]]|location=Washington, D.C.|url=https://www.loc.gov/item/93042885/|last=Sudetic|first=Charles|date=1994|editor1-last=Zickel|editor1-first=Raymond E.|edition=2nd|pages=155|isbn=0-8444-0792-5|oclc=29360048|editor2-last=Iwaskiw|editor2-first=Walter R.|entry=Telecommunications}}}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last1=Howe |first1=Marvin |title=A Glimpse into Albania |newspaper=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1989/12/10/travel/a-glimpse-into-albania.html |access-date=20 June 2020 |agency=The New York Times |date=10 December 1989}}</ref> Callers previously needed operator assistance even to make domestic long-distance calls.<ref name=":0" />

As of 1992, Albania's telephone density was the lowest in Europe, at 1.4 units for every 100 inhabitants.<ref name=":0" /> [[Tirana]] accounted for about 13,000 of the country's 42,000 direct lines; [[Durrës]], the main port city, ranked second with 2,000 lines; the rest were concentrated in [[Shkodër, Albania|Shkodër]], [[Elbasan]], [[Vlorë]], [[Gjirokastër]], and other towns.<ref name=":0" /> At one time, each village had a telephone but during the land redistribution of the early 1990s peasants knocked out service to about 1,000 villages by removing telephone wire for fencing.<ref name=":0" /> As of 1992, most of Albania's telephones were obsolete, low-quality East European models, some dating from the 1940s; workers at a Tirana factory assembled a small number of telephones from Italian parts.<ref name=":0" />

In the early 1990s, Albania had 240 microwave circuits carrying international calls to Italy and 180 to Greece.<ref name=":0" /> The Albanian telephone company had also installed two U-20 [[Italtel]] digital exchanges.<ref name=":0" /> The exchange in Tirana handled international, national, and local calls; the Durrës exchange handled only local calls.<ref name=":0" /> Two United States firms handled direct-dial calls from the United States to Tirana.<ref name=":0" />

At present{{when|date=August 2018}} the land lines are overloaded, and it is difficult to receive a telephone number. As a result, the number of mobile phones has skyrocketed in the bigger cities.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.inovacioni.gov.al/files/pages_files/183909149-LIGJI-Nr-97-2013-PER-MEDIAT-AUDIOVIZIVE-NE-REPUBLIKEN-E-SHQIPERISE1.pdf |title=Për mediat audiovizive në Republikën e Shqipërisë |access-date=2016-09-06 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160916045814/http://www.inovacioni.gov.al/files/pages_files/183909149-LIGJI-Nr-97-2013-PER-MEDIAT-AUDIOVIZIVE-NE-REPUBLIKEN-E-SHQIPERISE1.pdf |archive-date=2016-09-16 |url-status=dead }}</ref>