In a comment shared by r/Apple moderator @aaronp613, Reddit cited its Moderator Code of Conduct and said that it has a duty to keep communities “relied upon by thousands or even millions of users” operational. Mods who do not agree to reopen subreddits that have gone private will be removed.
If a moderator team unanimously decides to stop moderating, we will invite new, active moderators to keep these spaces open and accessible to users. If there is no consensus, but at least one mod wants to keep the community going, we will respect their decisions and remove those who no longer want to moderate from the mod team.
The Pinkertons are still around, and still being engaged by companies. Just a few months ago Wizards of the Coast (publishers of Magic the Gathering and Dungeons & Dragons) were caught using them to intimidate someone who had accidentally-but-legally received unreleased Magic cards into handing over the property.