I can confirm that some companies leave job postings up to seem like they're thriving for optics, and/or to pacify overworked undermanned teams for a bit longer.

I have had HR tell me that a candidate everyone loved interviewing for us took another offer; except that candidate messaged me on linked in thanking me for the time spent interviewing them, and thst they were disappointed we passed and what could they have done better?

While I'm not a fan of reaching out to the interviewer like that, it definitely confirmed what I thought about that company; we were never going to replace the people we lost, and all those promises to hire more was never going to materialize.

Unsurprisingly layoffs eventually wiped out most teams, and no, we never did hire the three missing positions. But we definitely had ads out for it.