Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server to conduct government business when she was US secretary of state was a mistake, but did not endanger national security, President Barack Obama has said.
In an interview on CBS's 60 Minutes TV programme, Mr Obama said public officials had to be more sensitive about how they handled information and personal data.
But he also said the criticism of Mrs Clinton, who is leading the Democratic race for the presidential nomination, had been "ginned up" because of politics.
"I think she'd be the first to acknowledge that maybe she could have handled the original decision better and the disclosures more quickly," Mr Obama said.
The president downplayed the threat to national security and when it was pointed out that his administration has prosecuted people for having classified material on their private computers, said he did not get the impression there was an intent to "hide something or to squirrel away information".
He also said he was not initially aware of her use of the private email server. Questions are still being raised about the security of that system.
Mr Obama also discussed his views on Syria during the interview. The administration is abandoning a failed Pentagon effort to build a new ground force of moderate rebels and overhauling its approach to instead partner with established rebel groups.
The change also reflects growing concern in Mr Obama's administration that Russia's intervention has complicated the Syrian battlefield and given new life to President Bashar Assad.
Mr Obama said he was "sceptical from the get-go" about the notion of creating an army of moderate forces within Syria.
"My goal has been to try to test the proposition, can we be able to train and equip a moderate opposition that's willing to fight Isil (another name for the Islamic State, or IS militants)? And what we've learned is that as long as Assad remains in power, it is very difficult to get those folks to focus their attention on Isil," he said.
Mr Obama said part of the strategy behind the administration's efforts was to "try different things", adding that "in a situation that is as volatile and with as many players as there are inside of Syria, there aren't any silver bullets".
While the Pentagon is abandoning its effort to train rebels, a CIA programme that since 2013 has trained some 10,000 rebels to fight Assad's forces is continuing.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article