I had a similar experience back in 2008 when I started a fully remote digital agency. One of my first employees was doing fantastic work, until his performance

I had a similar experience back in 2008 when I started a fully remote digital agency. One of my first employees was doing fantastic work, until his performance fell to 0 - no communication, no deliverables, nothing. Turns out, he stopped paying the subcontractor that was doing his job for him. The subcontractor contacted me months after I fired the employee and confessed. Apparently, the long-pauses and loud typing during my conversations with the employee was the employee messaging the subcontractor asking for help answering my questions. So, in my case, the employee was still the front. In this case, they're attempting to eliminate that bottleneck by just having the subcontractor impersonate the employee.