Leaked AT&T Documents Hint at LTE-Flavored iPad

Last night, the 6-man hacking group known as LulzSec ended their 50 days of chaos with one last act of mischief. The team once again published confidential data recovered from their latest attack. One of the folders in the stolen archives is titled “AT&T.”

In digging through the data, the folks over at iFans have come across some interesting information. The internal AT&T documents reveal that the carrier is planning to roll out their new LTE network in the first week of July, but that’s not all…

The archives also hint at what seems to be an LTE-flavored iPad. In a PowerPoint presentation titled “LTE Status,” a slide happens to mention Apple’s tablet. Why in the world would the iPad be mentioned in an LTE presentation? Take a look:

Pre-LTE scenarios. Testing will include iPad new activations HLS using the new rate plan, as well as a regression on netbooks and dongles. During validation E2E execution should ensure all functionality new and current is still functioning properly by validating account set up, provision, usage and notifications.

As 9to5Mac points out, this note can be interpreted in 1 of 2 ways. Either this document is suggesting that they will start testing the new iPad in November of this year, or the information could be from last year. But why would a 3G iPad be in an LTE PowerPoint?

Apple’s 3rd iteration of their popular tablet line is expected to be a major upgrade, with speculation suggesting everything from a Retina display to LTE capabilities.

While several rumors point to a fall launch of the iPad 3, the above slide begs to differ. If iPad 3 testing starts in November, we could expect to see the new tablet launch in its usual March setting next year.

What do you think? iPad 3 in the fall or next March?