[jessriedel]

In practice the US government is constrained from paying market rates for tech talent. It can either hire companies to complete the entire project, or it can hire a consulting service (which skims off a massive overhead) to provide technical talent inside a government agency.

[nexuist]

I would argue that this is obviously a national security operation and the shell company is operated by the FBI or the NSA, not necessarily some random contracting firm.