It is entirely true, assuming you are speaking of an infinite series of 9s following the decimal. There are a number of proofs of varying rigor but the simplest one to understand goes thus:
1 / 3 = .333 (infinite series)
.333 * 3 = .999 (infinite series)
Fundamental rules of arithmatic indicate that, in reversing the process exactly I ought to end up at the same result. Thus, while the result looks different it remains the same.
The trouble people have here is the fact that most people never take enough math to deal with the concept of infinity. A hundred million nines following the decimal doesn't equal one, it just gets incredibly close to one; you literally need an infinite number of nines before the number becomes a tedious stand in for one.
There are other examples of strangely perplexing conceptual problems dealing with infinity, the most famous of which is probably the one regarding an object approaching a finish line while that slows as it approaches. In the simplest form, in one measure of time, the object closes half the distance to the finish while in the next equal measure of time it covers half the remaining distance again and the question becomes will the object ever reach the finish line. The question is perplexing because it has two entirely correct answers. Given infinite measures of time the object will, in fact, reach the finish line as it is simply an infinite geometric series and as such has a predictable outcome at infinity in this case (the result converges to put it explicitly). But this entirely correct and technical answer isn't actually all that useful because no matter how short our arbitrary measure of time, it is safe to say that you don't have infinite units of it to see if our object reaches the goal. As such, one can say the object will not reach the finish line in any reality we care to measure.
The same is true of this problem. While the concept is simple and the proofs myriad, people have trouble accepting the proposition simply because we cannot concepualize infinity. One can examine the proofs and find that while some might lack rigour, the totality of evidence clearly points to the fact that .999 is indeed 1, or they can simply accept is as something that's true and have a dorky bit of trivia. There is a standard caution - unless it is explicitly stated that you have an infinite series of nines, one cannot assume the result equals one. In standard notation, when a series is known to repeat, one must first write out one entire portion of the pattern and append a horizontal bar across the last digit. When one does not have access to such things, they need to work out another ways of clarifying themselves.