Microsoft halts app publishing following Windows Phone 7.5 upgrade issue

Microsoft has temporarily suspended app publishing on its Windows Phone (WP) operating system following the discovery of a digital certificates issue affecting early smartphones upgraded to its WP 7.5 Mango platform.

The company confirmed it was temporarily postponing app publishing on the platform via a post on its Windows Phone Developer blog on Tuesday.

"This week we discovered an issue with our new digital certificates that's caused us to temporarily stop publishing new apps," read the blog.

"The issue impacts only phones that upgraded to Windows Phone 7.5 from an earlier version of the operating system and only apps published in the last couple of days."

The bug means that a handful of customers that try to download a new app receive an error message. A related issue stopping select users updating already installed apps has also been reported.

Microsoft has confirmed it is aware of the problem and is working on a fix. The company has recommended that users affected by the second update issue do not uninstall the affected app and instead wait for the fix.

"We don't recommend that people uninstall these apps because they might not be able to download and use them again until we deploy our fix," added the blog post.

"We've already identified the problem and are working to resolve it and resume certifying and publishing apps as quickly as possible."

Microsoft will be hoping the problem doesn't last long as the firm aims to fight back against Android and Apple in the smartphone market, with app ecosystems seen as a key battle ground for winning over new users.