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I have a cousin whose parents never told him he was adopted. They lived in a different state and I saw them rarely growing up.
When I was in college I spent a Thanksgiving holiday with my grandmother (closer to my college than home) and my cousins family was there. After dinner, I started to ask my aunt about the adoption - I had no idea it was a secret. She quickly hushed me and it was very uncomfortable - they had never told him. My Aunt was so anxious about being "discovered" that it almost consumed her.
About two years later - my cousin found out that he was adopted and he was devastated.
I think that there are really two problems with not telling your kids that they are adopted. First is that you are not being truthful. How can they trust their parents about anything if they can't trust you to be truthful about where they came from?
Second - it is devastating to a child's self-esteem when the parents think that their very origin is so shameful that it needs to be secret.
I suppose another way of looking at it is this: Your sister is the role model for how she wants her child to behave . . . What does she want her child to lie to her about?
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