A former aide to Hillary Clinton worried that broadcasting the number of State Department officials who relied on personal emails to conduct official business would “encourage” hackers, such as the one that attempted to hack the private account of Cheryl Mills, then Clinton’s chief of staff.

In a June 2011 email to Clinton, Anne-Marie Slaughter, a former State Department official who left the agency in Feb. 2011, suggested “someone inside or outside” the State Department should plant an op-ed that highlighted the weaknesses of the agency’s technology.