An early build of Windows Phone Blue was allegedly found deep inside a recently purchased Lumia 920, showing what appears to be a notification center. The build is supposedly as new as May 9, indicating that Microsoft is hard at work on adding the feature. Microsoft, of course, said it doesn’t comment on rumor or speculation, but doesn’t outright deny such a feature is incoming.

Microsoft has previously said that it basically “ran out of time” when developing Windows Phone 8, which is why a notification center isn’t there already. “[Microsoft is] thinking very, very hard on that one,” admitted Thomas Fennel last year, hinting strongly that the feature is a huge priority. The screenshots certainly suggest as much; each notification would provide access to that specific Live Tile notification.

According to The Verge, sources close to the update have confirmed the above screenshots are an early version of Windows Phone Blue. So, with that said, a notification center is indeed coming, along with improved multitasking, redesigned calendar and the ability to sort applications by name and frequency used. There’s always a chance of these being just a big hoax, but they certainly seem like natural additions to the platform.

The device, incidentally, was purchased off eBay, so an engineer or someone close to Microsoft could have improperly wiped the handset before selling it. But the cat seems to be out of the bag. To check out more screenshots grabbed from the build, head on over to Flickr.