But after NDAs have expired, strangers online revealed the secrets that finally saw the light of day when Redditor Charcoals7 asked:
"People who did super secret work: what is something you can share now, that you couldn't before?"
Some revealing information was not bound by signed contracts but kept secret through unspoken agreements out of respect for clients and employers.
Face Value
"Interned for a plastic surgeon who is very well known and does work on celebs. They sold their skincare line for hundreds of dollars and touted it as having highly advanced ingredients of the highest quality."
"They bought most of it from a wholesale retailer who stuck their name on the bottle. Website looked sketchy tbh. Also had '24k gold face masks' that were purchased in bundles off of Amazon for cheap."
"These fancy skincare lines are such a scam, don't waste your money."
The Massive Tool
"Worked at a sex shop nearly 10 years ago, confidentiality is key to a shop's success."
"Private order comes in, ordered by another associate. Specialty orders were far from uncommon. This though….this was the biggest one I'd ever seen. I patiently waited to see who would be picking up this behemoth."
"A very slender, very short, very nervous, but very kind man picked it up."
"I still wonder about that guy sometimes, and hope him and he's doing okay. . . "
Nude Client
"Painted a house for a lady that I accidentally walked in on naked. I was sworn to secrecy but sadly she passed so I think it's fair game now. RIP Granda Beatrice."
Literary Cultural Phenomenon
"When the Harry Potter books went to our stores they shipped 6 to a box in sealed boxes. When the store received them the boxes had to be locked in a controlled cage in the stockroom. This was to prevent theft and presales. The whole thing seemed super secret. And it had to be because of the hype. If fans got word a shipment had arrived before the sales date."
"Anyhow one year, I think it was for book 4, I got a call one of the stores received a shipment with a box open and a book missing. My bosses were hooping and hollering about how the people in that store were going to lose their jobs because of the theft. I knew the employees in the store and knew they weren't thieves."
"I went to investigate. I figured out the book had been stolen in transit. Not in the store. The secret solution? The shipping label was over the cut tape. No one lost their job that day."
Nestle Power
"Not super secret work but I ran the catering for a Cafe I worked at, I am also in the corner of the world where the blue superstore started so we have a lot of big companies around because to do business with the blue stores you have to have an office near by. Anyways, I had to deliver a lunch for a team meeting at Nestle and you would think I was joking when they not only patted me down upon arriving but I also had to have my picture taken and signed like 5 documents that stated I would not release information that I saw or overheard while setting up food for them. To this day I'm convinced that they are running this country somehow."
Lab Rats
"Fire sprinkler tech here. The amount of lab mice Cambridge laboratories use is insane. Walls on walls of mice being worked on."
"Also we had more security going in there than the airport. People were worried about eco-terrorists there."
People revealed the very things they were obligated to keep confidential were just humdrum.
No Big Mystery
"Sometimes, a project is 'super secret' and requires a USG security clearance before you're allowed to work on it... but it's actually just boring, poorly written code that barely succeeds in doing nothing of interest for people who shouldn't be allowed at a computer in the first place."
A Former Intern
"I worked on the Microsoft Dynamics SL Web Apps during my internship. Now that my NDA has expired, I can tell you that I implemented a data access layer for a subscreen of a subscreen that made it possible to add a new client, without having to back out and navigate to the new client screen. Most secrets, it turns out, are not very interesting."
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A Different Perspective
"Most of the time, it's not what is classified that's the important part, but how it's made/process/methods that are top secret."
"I'd reckon most countries know what others are working on, just not how to replicate it."
Abacadabra
"I worked on a magic show there's a lot to be said for black velvet drapes and tight focus lighting."
– joeinbow
The truth from historical events are revealed by those who were a part of it.
America's Involvement
"Dad (died 2016) was in the Navy and on one of the ships in the blockade that was part of the Cuban Missile Crisis. The official story is that no American ship fired any shots."
"A few months before he died Dad said his ship was one of several that fired shots."
– xkulp8
British Presence
"During the 1982 Falklands conflict it was spread on the news that several British submarines were in the area and this is likely what deterred the Argentine carrier Vientecinco de mayo from engaging the British fleet."
"My father was a submariner at the time (didn't go down there), when he was in the bar on base back home and it was announced on the radio that a certain British submarine was in the area the guy next to him said 'I hope not, I just walked off it an hour ago.'"
"Basically pulled the same trick the Royal Navy used against the Graf Spee in 1939."
Working On "Electronics"
"Not me, but my grandfather (RIP) worked as a civilian on various military bases from the 50s to the 80s. He held a top secret clearance and could not tell anyone what he did. He'd just tell them he worked on 'electronics'. Well he sure did. He finally told us some of what he worked on around 2010. He worked on developing the A bomb, the sidewinder or stinger missile (can't recall which) and I believe it was the F14."
"He told us one story in which he and some coworkers were put in a van with no windows and driven from CA to an undisclosed location (he thinks it was white sands, NM) to test some missle system. Kinda nutty."
Developing America's First Nuclear Weapons
"My Great-Grandfather worked on the Manhattan Project. He was a physics professor at a University and the government basically told him that he would be moving away from his family indefinitely and could not speak with them except under very strict monitoring. From my understanding (passed down a few generations obviously) he was forcibly 'volunteered' for the project. He couldn't even tell his wife and kids what he did until years later, other than that he was helping in the war effort."
– tschera
Former Army Intel
"Not me, but my step-dad. Army Intel. 1961-1964 stationed in West Berlin and later for a little while in Alaska."
"He once pulled a weapon on a superior officer and didn't get court martialed. As in 'you look under that tarp and i will have to shoot you.'"
"He was listening in when Yuri Gagarin flew overhead."
I heard from a former Abercrombie & Fitch employee that the apparel store had a tough interview process and basically hired someone based on appearances.
She claimed the store would designate the thinner, more attractive employees to work at the front of the store while "the others" would work in the back, doing inventory.
This was years ago, but to me, it seemed like hardly a secret.
As a visitor, I would instantly notice all the "models" working the entrance at an A&F store before the intensity of the company's powerful Fierce fragrance blown through the vent knocked me unconscious.