Apps in Windows Marketplace for Mobile Have Remote Kill Switch

windows-mobileMicrosoft is readying the Windows Marketplace, which is expected to launch in just a few weeks. The Marketplace, an online shop for finding and buying apps for Windows phones based on the Windows Mobile OS, is Microsoft’s answer to the Apple iTunes App Store. The store will carry apps for the upcoming Windows Mobile 6.5 platform at first, with support for the older 6.1 version later this year. Troubling information about the Marketplace has appeared at the Microsoft Tech.Ed in New Zealand. Microsoft has admitted that apps sold in the Marketplace have a remote kill switch, and that approved apps sold in the store that are subsequently removed will be automatically deleted from customer devices — reminiscent of the Amazon Kindle book deleting.

The company didn’t provide clarification on whether this is for free apps only, or if it applies to paid apps, how that might work. If paid apps are removed from customers’ devices then a reasonable assumption would be that refunds would be issued. We should also make it clear that this is not a likely scenario — hopefully, Microsoft will be diligent in the approval phase to keep such apps out of the store to begin with. It does hint at an example like the Kindle situation, where companies feel justified in deleting content from customer devices. It’s a wireless world we live in, after all.

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