IIS web deploy fails with "Unknown rule: AppOffline"

Question

I have a strange problem with MS Web Deploy. Publishing our project on the development server works fine. But it does not work on the production server. There the following error appears during publishing: "Web depolyment task failed". The rest of the error message is partially localized. At the end it says: "Unknown rule: AppOffline".

Unfortunately I can't find anything about this strange error message on the Internet. Can someone tell me what exactly is going wrong and how I can fix the error?

Web deployment task failed. ((22.06.2020 15:48:57) Fehler beim Verarbeiten der Anforderung auf dem Remotecomputer.)

(22.06.2020 15:48:57) Fehler beim Verarbeiten der Anforderung auf dem Remotecomputer.
Exception has been thrown by the target of an invocation.
   at System.RuntimeMethodHandle.SerializationInvoke(IRuntimeMethodInfo method, Object target, SerializationInfo info, StreamingContext& context)
   at System.Runtime.Serialization.ObjectManager.CompleteISerializableObject(Object obj, SerializationInfo info, StreamingContext context)
   at System.Runtime.Serialization.ObjectManager.FixupSpecialObject(ObjectHolder holder)
   at System.Runtime.Serialization.ObjectManager.DoFixups()
   at System.Runtime.Serialization.Formatters.Binary.ObjectReader.Deserialize(HeaderHandler handler, __BinaryParser serParser, Boolean fCheck, Boolean isCrossAppDomain, IMethodCallMessage methodCallMessage)
   at System.Runtime.Serialization.Formatters.Binary.BinaryFormatter.Deserialize(Stream serializationStream, HeaderHandler handler, Boolean fCheck, Boolean isCrossAppDomain, IMethodCallMessage methodCallMessage)
   at Microsoft.Web.Deployment.Base64EncodingHelper.DeserializeHelper(BinaryFormatter formatter, Byte[] buffer)
   at Microsoft.Web.Deployment.Base64EncodingHelper.Deserialize(String str, Exception& handledException)
   at Microsoft.Web.Deployment.SerializationHelper.Deserialize(String str)
   at Microsoft.Web.Deployment.DeploymentAgentWorkerRequest.GetTraceMessage(String[] additionalMessage)
   at Microsoft.Web.Deployment.DeploymentAgent.HandleSync(DeploymentAgentWorkerRequest workerRequest)
   at Microsoft.Web.Deployment.DeploymentAgent.HandleRequestWorker(DeploymentAgentAsyncData asyncData)
   at Microsoft.Web.Deployment.DeploymentAgent.HandleRequest(DeploymentAgentAsyncData asyncData)
   at Microsoft.Web.Deployment.DeploymentAgent.BeginProcessRequest(DeploymentAgentWorkerRequest workerRequest, AsyncCallback callback, Object extraData)
Unbekannte Regel: 'AppOffline'.

PS: The error message translates to: "Error processing the request on the remote computer."