Apple has been quick to address the latest glitch in the Mac App Store that which caused newly-updated applications to crash. The issue was first spotted by Marco Arment, creator of the widely popular Instapaper title. Users who were affected by the issue can now remove the corrupted app versions from their computers and re-download the corrected versions from the store. The company doesn’t expect the bug to trouble its customers ever again.
The issue was reportedly caused by a server generating DRM code for some applications being downloaded. Apple has promised to delete any one-star reviews given to the affected apps due to the glitch, which came despite developers’ efforts. Arment tracked over 114 corrupted titles, including his own, before he stopped counting. Shortly afterwards, the issue somehow resolved itself – in less than two days after it was reported, users could again download and install the app properly.
Since a huge number of applications were updated during the U.S. holiday period, though, Apple’s claim that the bug plagued a small group of users is likely based on percentages compared to the overall number of app owners rather than a minority of affected customers. Hundreds of support tickets over the issue flowed into various app labs, many ignorantly blaming the bug on the developers as they didn’t know the issue was widespread. Earlier, Apple acknowledged that the source of the problem lurked in its own App Store and assured affected users it was actively working on the bug fix.
