Network Access Protection (NAP) is a relatively-new technology from Microsoft that can be used independently of UAG to provide better network security by ensuring that clients are in good "health". The well-known cure for computer-sniffles is an Antivirus, of course, and organizations throughout the world have been looking for creative ways to keep their computers safe.
NAP was first introduced with Windows 2008, and one could say it's somewhat similar to UAG's endpoint detection mechanism, though it's also used for local Network access. To do its work, NAP has 3 main components:
NAP health policy servers (HPS), which are computers running the Network Policy Server (NPS) service on a Windows Server 2008 or Windows Server 2008 R2.
Health Registration Authority (HRA), which can be a computers running Windows Server 2008 or 2008 R2, but also a VPN server, a DHCP server or even hardware Network Switches that have been designed to support NAP.
System Health...