D.A.R.P.A.

Darpa is not an Agency to be overlyworried about. Some of the best research is promoted by them, and they also fund projects that would never have gotten off the ground that save lives, and promote technology research.
A man developed a type of clotting system that could save hundreds of lives each year. Nobody wanted to fund his project, except the Military. His clotting system has saved lives in Iraq, and is now available to everyone at your local store.
DARPA routinely enlists the aid of small, cutting edge companys to Research and Manufacture procucts and technologies to promote education and training of the military. These same programs are then transferred to commercial and civilian use. ( dont forget the internet was a Military project converted to civilian use also.) Most of the products you use today are available because the Government funded their research in the first place.
Keep an eye on them..? you bet. worry about them...no need

DARPA also had a fair amount to do with military research funding shifting from organizational based to STO based (objective-based). This allows funding to shift to researchers in private industry or other goverment labs, if they can do the work of the orginal lab faster, better, cheaper. In reality, it has little effect on home institutes getting money for their mission-oriented STOs, but it keeps a sense of urgency amoung the researchers that they must produce something.

DARPA acellerates research that needs to be done in a hurry (by government standards anyway). While they are envolved with some classified projects, the most classifed work often does not envolve DARPA, as they are an additional layer of people that often don't need to know about institute-driven classified research. Now, top-driven classified research might be more likely to be pushed through DARPA.