ASCENDSC™ Calls for a New South Carolina Framework as Public Trust Erodes Around Surveillance, Infrastructure and Rural Growth
CHARLESTON, S.C. — September 2026 — Public trust is under pressure across South Carolina.
Communities are raising concerns about surveillance, data aggregation, aging infrastructure, water use, energy demand, property values and whether rural communities are truly benefiting from the economic changes being built around them.
At the same time, artificial intelligence, digital assets and large-scale compute infrastructure are advancing faster than many existing public policies were designed to address.
ASCENDSC™ was created in response to that conflict.
The South Carolina Emerging Tech Association’s Building the Trust State™ initiative is designed to give citizens, policymakers and industry a common framework for deciding how South Carolina should approach the next economy before technology, infrastructure and policy decisions are made in isolation.
“The question is no longer whether South Carolina will participate in the digital economy,” said Dennis Fassuliotis, President of the South Carolina Emerging Tech Association. “The question is whether citizens will trust how it is built.”
ASCENDSC is not a campaign to promote data centers, artificial intelligence or digital assets for their own sake. It is a framework for asking what South Carolina needs from these technologies and what protections, accountability and public benefits citizens should expect in return.
Trust Is Infrastructure
Artificial intelligence is changing how information is created, consumed and trusted. Surveillance technologies are becoming more capable. Digital identity and payments are beginning to converge. Large-scale computing is placing new demands on energy systems, utilities and local infrastructure.
Against that backdrop, SCETA’s position is simple: Trust is infrastructure.
“Seeing is no longer believing,” said Dr. W. Scott Stornetta, co-inventor of blockchain and a featured ASCENDSC speaker. “The states that understand trust as infrastructure will be better positioned to compete in the next economy while protecting the people who live there.”
ASCENDSC organizes that challenge around a simple structure. Its foundational layers include trusted digital identity and payments, supporting an economy increasingly built around energy, compute, capital and policy. Those systems, SCETA argues, must operate within clear expectations for privacy, digital rights, transparency, accountability and individual freedom.
From Surveillance to a Citizens Digital Bill of Rights
One of the clearest signs of declining public trust is the growing concern surrounding surveillance and the aggregation and use of personal data.
License-plate readers, cameras, artificial intelligence, automated decision systems and increasingly sophisticated forms of digital tracking have created difficult questions for state and local governments.
ASCENDSC’s response is not to reject technology, but to establish the rights of citizens first.
SCETA is advancing the concept of a Citizens Digital Bill of Rights built around principles including privacy, informed consent, data minimization, transparency, control over digital identity and safeguards against inappropriate surveillance or automated decision-making.
The principle is straightforward: technology should expand human agency, not replace it.
Infrastructure, Energy and Who Pays
The rapid growth of compute infrastructure has also intensified questions surrounding electric generation, grid capacity and the cost of new development.
ASCENDSC calls for clearer cost accountability so that large new users bear the infrastructure costs associated with their projects rather than shifting those costs onto existing residential and business customers.
At the same time, SCETA argues that properly structured compute facilities can contribute to grid resilience through demand response, flexible load management and new investment in energy infrastructure.
The policy challenge is not simply whether South Carolina should permit or oppose data centers. It is how South Carolina can ensure that infrastructure development strengthens the state rather than creating additional burdens for the communities in which it is located.
Water and Natural Resources
Water has emerged as another central concern in South Carolina’s development debate.
Residents are asking legitimate questions about consumption, wastewater capacity, aquifers, local water systems and whether existing infrastructure can support large new industrial and technology projects.
ASCENDSC supports greater transparency around resource requirements and encourages policymakers to distinguish among different technologies and facility designs rather than treating every data center or compute project as identical.
Projects that use closed-loop systems, require comparatively little water or provide other infrastructure benefits should be evaluated differently from developments that place significantly greater demands on local resources.
The objective, SCETA says, should be informed development rather than development at any cost — or opposition to every project.
A Different Model for Rural Economic Development
The debate is particularly important for rural South Carolina.
Traditional economic development has often been measured primarily by job counts. But the compute economy may require a different set of metrics.
Large capital investments can expand tax bases, support infrastructure, create opportunities for local businesses and provide economic activity without producing the residential sprawl, traffic and public-service demands associated with some traditional development models.
That does not mean every project is appropriate.
It means South Carolina should ask a broader question: What kind of development creates the greatest long-term benefit for the community?
ASCENDSC seeks to bring rural leaders, utilities, economic-development organizations, conservation interests, industry and citizens into that conversation.
South Carolina Has an Opportunity to Lead
South Carolina already has an important foundation.
With the enactment of the South Carolina Financial Freedom Act, S.163, the state established a statutory framework recognizing digital-asset rights and laying groundwork for broader participation in the digital economy.
SCETA believes the next opportunity is to connect digital assets with the larger transformation taking place around artificial intelligence, energy, compute, identity and payments.
Rather than addressing each technology through isolated legislation, ASCENDSC proposes a coordinated statewide strategy.
“South Carolina does not have to choose between innovation and individual freedom,” Fassuliotis said. “We can build the infrastructure required for artificial intelligence and the digital economy while protecting citizens, strengthening communities and creating new economic opportunity. That is what we mean by Building the Trust State™.”
ASCENDSC™ 2026: Building the Trust State™
These issues will come together in Charleston during ASCENDSC™ 2026: Building the Trust State™, September 16–18.
The forum will bring together leaders in technology, public policy, energy, economic development, digital identity, cybersecurity, digital assets, finance and rural development.
Participants will examine how South Carolina can align the major components of the emerging compute economy:
Energy. Compute. Capital. Policy. Identity. Payments. Trust.
The goal is not simply another technology conference.
It is to begin building a practical roadmap for how South Carolina can compete in the next economy while preserving the freedoms and public trust that make that economy worth building.
About the South Carolina Emerging Tech Association
The South Carolina Emerging Tech Association is a statewide organization focused on helping policymakers, businesses and citizens understand and responsibly adopt emerging technologies.
SCETA works across areas including artificial intelligence, blockchain and digital assets, digital identity, cybersecurity, compute infrastructure and related public policy.
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