WOW. AT&T says Apple iPhone 4 pre-orders were 10 times higher than the first day of iPhone 3GS pre-orders last year.

And Apple just announced that it took 600,000 iPhone 4 pre-orders yesterday.

That explains why AT&T's and Apple's systems were so hosed -- and why Apple and AT&T sold out, and why AT&T has suspended pre-orders. But it doesn't excuse AT&T's privacy meltdown.

This suggests our prediction of 2 million iPhone 4 units sold by June 27 is doable, if Apple can manufacture and ship them fast enough.

AT&T issued the following statement today:

iPhone 4 pre-order sales yesterday were 10-times higher than the first day of pre-ordering for the iPhone 3G S last year. Consumers are clearly excited about iPhone 4, AT&T's more affordable data plans and our early upgrade pricing.

Given this unprecedented demand and our current expectations for our iPhone 4 inventory levels when the device is available June 24, we're suspending pre-ordering today in order to fulfill the orders we've already received.

The availability of additional inventory will determine if we can resume taking pre-orders.

In addition to unprecedented pre-order sales, yesterday there were more than 13 million visits to AT&T's website where customers can check to see if they are eligible to upgrade to a new phone; that number is about 3-times higher than the previous record for eligibility upgrade checks in one day.

We are working hard to bring iPhone 4 to as many of our customers as soon as possible.

AT&T products and services are provided or offered by subsidiaries and affiliates of AT&T Inc. under the AT&T brand and not by AT&T Inc.

For more information and detailed disclaimer information, please review this announcement in the AT&T newsroom at http://www.att.com/newsroom .