RUTHFULLY YOURS

Which foreign intelligence agencies tried to hack the computer server in the basement of the Clinton suburban home? Did any succeed? And if so, how did these countries use the hacked information against the U. S.?

The State Department last week confirmed that at least 22 of Mrs. Clinton’s 1,600 classified emails include information that is “top secret” or an even higher level of classification, known as “special access programs.” The latter applies to communications for which “the vulnerability of, or threat to, specific information is exceptional,” such as the names of sources and undercover officers.

Americans won’t see these highly sensitive emails, which were likely read in real time by intelligence agents from China, Russia and Iran. But one was described to NBC, which reported that it referred to an undercover CIA officer as a State Department official with the word “State” in scare quotes, signaling to readers the officer was not really a diplomat.

Mrs. Clinton asserted in last week’s Democratic presidential debate that she is “100% confident” she won’t be charged with a crime. She ignored the issue of hacking by foreign agents and complained about “retroactive classifications.” Yet she signed the standard nondisclosure agreement acknowledging her responsibility to keep classified information secret whether “marked or unmarked.” In one of her emails, she responded to a complaint that staffers were having trouble sending a secure fax by writing: “If they can’t, turn into nonpaper w no identifying heading and send nonsecure.”

Mrs. Clinton tried to evade responsibility by claiming other secretaries of state committed the same sin, citing reports that Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice received a handful of potentially classified emails. But it was Mrs. Clinton alone who chose to set up and use only a personal email system for all her communications, knowingly risking access by foreign agents.

Unless the Clinton team wiped records from the server before producing it to be inspected, there should be logs indicating who tried to gain access—and who succeeded. In an era when cyber spies have penetrated many government departments, it is highly likely that foreign agents got into her homebrew server. The Associated Press reported that the way the computer in her home was set up would allow “users to connect openly over the Internet to control it remotely.”

Robert Gates, the former defense secretary, told radio host Hugh Hewitt recently that “the odds are pretty high” Russia, China and Iran hacked Mrs. Clinton’s emails. Former Attorney General Michael Mukasey wrote in The Wall Street Journal last month that the intelligence community is “nearly certain that Mrs. Clinton’s server was hacked,” which would create blackmail opportunities against Mrs. Clinton and anyone she or her correspondents mentioned. U.S. intelligence agencies are now reviewing all their operations under the costly assumption that the cover of any program or person referenced in Clinton emails is blown.

Aside from the classified emails, there would be enormous damage if cyber spies gained access to all the digital communication involving the top American diplomat for the four years Mrs. Clinton held that office. Spies would have known the information available to the Obama administration and how its diplomatic strategies evolved over time. This might explain why Iran out-negotiated Washington on the one-sided nuclear deal, why Russia felt safe in its provocations, and why Beijing confidently claimed more of the South China Sea. And foreign governments would have access to all 60,000 emails, not just the 30,000 Mrs. Clinton chose to turn over.

Mrs. Clinton can’t plead ignorance. She gave numerous speeches as secretary of state detailing successful cyber attacks on much better-protected servers at government agencies and U.S. companies. Yet she made America’s secrets and diplomacy available on an unprotected server in her suburban home.

Voters will decide if someone whose judgment made hacking easy for the nation’s enemies can ever be trusted as commander in chief. Hacking and other cybersecurity risks should be pressing matters for debate among presidential candidates.

A book by Council on Foreign Relations scholar Adam Segal will be published this month titled “The Hacked World Order: How Nations Fight, Trade, Maneuver, and Manipulate in the Digital Age.” Meanwhile, Americans shouldn’t have to wait for Vladimir Putin’s memoirs to learn how foreign agents used Mrs. Clinton’s cyber loose lips to their advantage.