Hi All
AirWatch and Microsoft has identified a critical problem with upgrading to WindowsPhone 10 where a problem in the whitelisting process can brick your phone.
Details below.
Issue Overview
The Windows
product team has identified several issues with Whitelisting support of
applications on Windows 10 Mobile devices. End users may experience a condition
in which system and native inbox applications are inadvertently blocked when
upgrading or fresh enrolling a Windows 10 Mobile device. These applications
cannot be reinstalled if they fail during upgrade. A key application affected
is the Microsoft settings app. Without this app, end users will not be able to
access settings menus on the device.
New Windows 10 native (inbox) apps are not installed when migrating
from Windows Phone 8.1 to Windows 10 Mobile. This will prevent the
settings application and other MSFT native applications from being
installed, causing the device to enter an unrecoverable state.Windows 10 Mobile native applications and the Windows store are
inadvertently blocked when deploying an application control policy.Publisher whitelisting rules do not take effect on Windows 10
Mobile devices.
Root Cause
On OS upgrade the native (inbox) applications are migrated to new
appIDs and therefore blocked. The OS does not handle the migration of
whitelisting these new application IDs. Microsoft has identified this is a
known issue.Device settings menus are applications and require whitelisting.
Prior to the upgrade to Windows 10, the settings menu did not require
whitelisting. Without specifically whitelisting the settings apps, devices
enter an unrecoverable state upon upgrading to Windows 10.
Workaround
The AirWatch
Product team has raised this issue with Microsoft and received the following
guidance for working around these issues. Microsoft will be posting a Tech Net
bulletin in the coming days.
Before
deploying Windows 10 Mobile in the customer environment ensure one of the below
solutions is implemented
Remove the application Whitelist policy prior to upgrade.Deploy the attached XML (also available here) to all devices prior to upgrade. Please note the
XML must be deployed as is. Failure to whitelist all specified
applications may cause the device to enter an unrecoverable state. Create a Custom
Settings profile targeted to Windows Phone
devices in the AirWatch Console.Paste the XML from the attached document into
the profile.Deploy the profile to all Windows Phone 8.1
*devices prior to upgrade to Windows 10 Mobile.