Apple has remedied an issue with its Family Sharing system for iOS that prevented many iPhone and iPad users accessing their applications over the weekend.
The iOS bug caused an error alert to appear whenever an affected user attempted to open certain applications, reading: “This app is no longer shared with you”.
Alerts of this kind are typical if changes are made to a user’s access privileges, but in this case apps were rendered inaccessible whether settings had been tinkered with or not.
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Some users found the problem could be fixed easily enough by deleting the affected applications via the Settings pane and then reinstalling, but to do this many times over would undoubtedly have been a frustrating affair.
Apple has confirmed a full fix has now been issued, but did not reveal specifics about the cause of the original problem.
iOS app updates
In connection with the bug, many iPhone and iPad users also reported a sudden spike in the number of apps queued for an update over the weekend.
Apple appeared to reissue a number of recent updates for popular applications, forcing some users to reinstall the latest iteration of software already present (and fully-updated) on their devices.
The volume of updates required varied user-by-user, depending on how many apps were installed on the device, but reportedly reached up to 100 in some instances.
Apple supplied no official explanation (and did not respond immediately to our request for clarification at the time) but it now appears the mysterious onslaught of updates was connected with the ongoing development of a fix for the Family Sharing bug.
Now the issue has been resolved, iPhone and iPad owners should be able to access their applications as normal.
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Via The Verge and TechCrunch
