The Health Key and Certificate Management (hkmsvc) service provides X.509 certificate and key management services for the Network Access Protection Agent (NAP) service as part of the Network Access Protection platform. Enforcement technologies that use X.509 certificates may not function properly if this service is not installed or is disabled.

The NAP platform helps administrators validate and enforce compliance with system health policies for network access and communication. Administrators can create solutions to validate computers that connect to or communicate on their networks, to provide needed updates or access to needed resources, and to limit the network access of computers that are noncompliant.

This service is installed by default and its startup type is Manual. When the Health Key and Certificate Management service is started in its default configuration, it logs on by using the Local System account.

The Health Key and Certificate Management service is dependent upon the following system components:

• Remote Procedure Call (RPC)
• DCOM Server Process Launcher
• RPC Endpoint Mapper