User blog comment:JediSpectre117/Regarding the surviving Prothean./@comment-87.212.54.159-20120305113647/@comment-1900300-20120305224755

No the Reapers used indoctroctrinated Protheans as sleeper agents. Collectors did not appear until centruies into the war, possibly the last few years of it, and they were used as front-line soldiers. A Collector would never last two seconds as a spy. The different body structure, the glowing eyes, the inability to talk. They make great spies.

The Protheans (at least some as we see from the Prothean artifact in ME2) knew about the Collectors and sent a warning about them. They saw them as the abominations they were in two seconds.

The point is the Collector didnt need to look like Protheans, and the only reason they do is because the Reaper couldnt be bother altering their gentic structure more. Indoctrinated Protheans were much better agents, Collectors were cannon fodder