Staff profile

Abdurrahman Cankurtaran

Since October 2023, Abdurrahman Cankurtaran has been a full-time PhD candidate at the Durham Law School. He completed his undergraduate degree at Erciyes University Faculty of Law (2017-2021) and Istanbul Commerce University, Communication Faculty, Media and Communication System (2013-2017). He has a Master's degree in Cultural Studies from Erciyes University (2017-2019). In his master thesis, he analysed the "Black Mirror" series in the context of Antonio Gramsci's cultural hegemony concept.

Supervised by Professor Deryck Beyleveld and Professor Shaun Pattinson, his PhD research title is "The Micro-Targeted Propaganda Challenge for Kantian Freedom: Can Applicable Personal Data Protection Regulations Protect Personal Data?" In this research, the relationship between freedom, free will, and propaganda will be examined, and it will be investigated to what extent developing personalised manipulation techniques with the help of digital technologies threatens freedom. Subsequently, existing data protection laws will be examined and questioned to what extent the laws successfully prevent this threat.