Rumor: Photos of supposed 'iPhone 6' backlight hit Web

In what could be a sign that production of Apple's upcoming "iPhone 6" is well underway, photos of a supposedly leaked LED backlight for the handset's 4.7-inch LCD display hit the Web on Friday.

As with previous hardware "leaks," the set of three photos come from Chinese microblogging site Sina Weibo, which was subsequently picked up by French blog nowehereelse.fr.

It should be noted that the pictures offer no sense of scale and reports of physical dimensions originate from the heretofore unknown Sina poster. AppleInsider cannot vouch for the veracity of the images and presents the following for purposes of discussion only.

That being said, the author of the post claims the backlight has been designed to fit behind a 4.7-inch display and is very similar to past designs from Apple products like the iPhone 5s and 5c. For example, the flex cable is located at the bottom of the panel, suggesting a continuity of logic board design and internal layout.

There are differences between the alleged backlight and current replacement parts, however. The aforementioned flex connector has been slightly repositioned and the new unit appears to feature three contact pads instead of two on the iPhone 5s version. Also shown is what appears to be a component breakdown of the backlight assembly as well as a batch of finished units, seen below.

Friday's photos are the second alleged iPhone 6 production part "leak" to come from Sina Weibo, the first being a front cover panel shown off in April. In that case, the component was pictured next to an iPhone 5s for scale, though it is unclear if the part is legitimate or a mockup.

Over the past weeks a number of outlets have posted images of iPhone 6 dummy models, some of which appear to be based on questionable three-dimensional renders leaked in March. Most recently, photos of a metal casting purportedly used to mold third-party cases showed up in Romania.