"What's the big deal they were only emails."
That's what some of my friends say...
That comes from complete ignorance. Anyone who would say or believe such a thing has absolutely zero understanding of how the world works. Also, those individuals have never lived or been in austere environments, or had their assess in harms way, and relied upon confidentiality to help keep their lives out of jeopardy.
I am not saying that I am anyone special, but I am / have been entrusted to do special things. I have a TS clearance, some of my colleagues go with higher classifications within the TS.
Many people were upset when something simple as our SF86's being hacked and others here on this forum may have been notified and included in that debacle, putting many peoples way of life, or even their very lives in grave danger. Those simple types of incidents arise out of stupidity like having your own email servers. Far far far worse things can happen when it is the Secretary of Defense has her work information "hacked". Can we imagine the details and countries secrets that she let out. Lives lost, that we would never know about, but some patriot of the US and their family will get a funeral and a flag if lucky because of it. And that is only scratching the surface and one simple example of the harm that could be done to the entire United States.
I can guarantee that
ANYONE who is reading this now, would be facing a sure 25 to life in Leavenworth for having done 1/10,000..... of what Hillary did.