I work with databases all the time, there's all kinds of dates (ways dates are read.. defaults) and reasons to be in there even if just leftover.

Doesn't mean anything else is happening. It's a database, a row's existence doesn't imply anything other than the row exists.

This kind of "revelation" reeks of middle manager who just got hired and is shocked by X,Y,Z because they're too foolish to ask + too ignorant to know better.