Methods and devices for qualifying a client machine to access a network, based on policies governing required protective measures, such as virus checking and operating system updates, are disclosed. A client machine must pass various checks to qualify for access. A client machine may be redirected to remediation resources that support efforts to bring the client machine into compliance with applicable network access requirements. A policy repository is updated regularly by vendors of protective measures. An administrator establishes user roles that are mapped to policy rule sets retrieved from the policy repository. The policy rule sets govern qualification of client machines for access to the network in accordance with the roles of the users of the machines. An access server is an intermediary between a client machine and the access manager. A client agent runs on the client machine and carries out checks, and reports the results via the access server to the access manager.