Having Issues After Updating iOS Apps from the App Store? You Are Not the Only One

If you are having issues with apps after updating them through the App Store then you are not the only one. Users have been reporting issues such as apps crashing right after updating them. This was note after popular app Instapaper was updated to version 4.2.3 and the app crashed upon opening it.

Instapaper developer Marco Arment expressed in a post on his blog that the version he submitted was good and of course the app should have pass through the usual review process and Apple would have never approved such update if the app was buggy.

This happened to me. The app crashed right after I updated; I uninstalled it and re installed the app and it solved the problem. In most instances this seems to solve the issue, but not for everybody, not every app.

According to Arment, the App Store is giving away corrupt version of apps in something that is called corrupt App Store binaries. He argues that is not specific to the iOS App Store, it is also present in the Mac App Store.

He cites a list of symptoms:

• The app crashes immediately on launch, every time, even after a delete and reinstall as long as the corrupt file is being served by the App Store.
• It doesn’t even show the Default.png before crashing. Just a split-second of a partial fade to black, then back to Springboard.
• It may only affect customers in some regions.
• If updating from iTunes, some customers might get a dialog citing error 8324 or 8326.
• Mac apps might show this dialog:
  “[App] is damaged and can’t be opened. Delete [App] and download it again from the App Store.”
• The console might show:AppleFairplayTextCrypterSession::fairplayOpen() failed, error -42110

Many were skeptic about this situation until more apps started to show the same problem; Marco has been vocal about this and developers are letting him know if they are having the same issues. He has posted a list with the affected apps.

Any word from Apple? Nothing official at the moment. The issue is critical as most developers will hold off from submitting apps to the App Store until the issue is solved. 

Maybe I should submit Instapaper 4.2.4. Changelog:Apple bug fixes

— Marco Arment (@marcoarment) July 4, 2012