Secrecy defines system boundaries in covert organizations. [causal]
One finds system boundaries characterized as trust boundaries particularly in all social systems engaged in operations which are not supposed to be revealed to the outside or are even illegal and therefore have to be kept secret.
XREF: Connects to sociological concepts of systems theory and boundary maintenance, possibly Luhmann's work on social systems and trust.
Niklas Luhmann, Trust and Power, loc. 315