A site called Neosmart Technologies has leaked some information. That information is that Windows XP Service Pack 3 is going to include some of the features that were found only in Windows Vista. SP3 for XP was released to beta testers just a few days ago.

The features reported to be in SP3 are not likely to be used by a majority of desktop users. A story on ComputerWorld says the following:

Features backported from Vista, said NeoSmart, include Network Access Protection (NAP), an enterprise policy enforcement technology that inspects client PCs before they access a corporate network, then updates the machines if necessary or blocks them if they don’t meet specified security criteria.

Other additions range from a kernel module containing several encryption algorithms that can be accessed by third-party developers, to a new Windows activation model that doesn’t require users to enter a product key.

XP has recently been breathing new life into XP. The announcement of a third service pack and the extension of the timeframe for XP’s availability mean that XP isn’t going anywhere yet.

And that’s a good thing.