Dr. Umer Bilal Khan

Master’s thesis topics for students: Digital governance and consumer protection; Big tech, public functions, and normative accountability; Digital sovereignty and consumer rights; Regulatory gaps in data governance.

Dr. Umer Bilal Khan is a postdoctoral researcher at the Chair of Information Systems at the University of Siegen. His research focuses on digital sovereignty, digital consumer protection, and digital governance mainly from legal, regulatory and governance perspective.

He is currently working on a Digital Consumer Protection (DCP) threat model to systematically assess digital harms facing consumers in datafied environments and identify weaknesses in existing protection frameworks.

A Friedrich-Naumann-Stiftung doctoral fellow and DAAD Helmut-Schmidt scholar, he holds a doctorate from the University of Rostock (2024), and Master's in Public Policy & Governance from the University of Passau (2017). His PhD dissertation “Beyond Contractualism: Analysis of the Problem of International Authority” analyzed how non-state actors — big tech and PMSCs — wield quasi-public authority beyond regulatory reach.

Academic and Professional Engagements:

Co-Coordinator — Erasmus+ KA220-HED, Digital Citizen Project (2026) https://erasmusdigitalcitizen.com/

Associate Researcher — MAGGI Research Group, Max Planck Institute (2020 – present) https://www.mpil.de/en/pub/research/projects/research-groups/the-multiplication-of-authorit.cfm 

Coordinator — Initiative Integration, Friedrich-Naumann-Stiftung (2021 – 2022)

Policy Officer — Government of Balochistan, World Bank GPP Project (2019 – 2020)

Human Rights Advocacy (Traineeship) — European Parliament, Brussels (2017)