Wikipedia has locked the pages of several Republicans being mentioned as possible running mates for Mitt Romney, perhaps as a response to some shenanigans from Stephen Colbert.

The entries for Rob Portman, Tim Pawlenty, Paul Ryan and Chris Christie all have locks on them with a message that the page is either fully or partially "protected due to vandalism." The page for CIA Director David Petraeus has also been locked, because he got mentioned on the Drudge Report as a possible contender.

BLOG: Portman stumps for Romney

Micah Sifry, co-founder of the Personal Democracy Forum and editor of the TechPresident blog, suggested earlier this week that clues about Romney's vice presidential pick could be found on Wikipedia, which bills itself as the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit.

Then last night, Colbert pretended to do some tinkering to the Pawlenty entry on his Comedy Central show. And he urged those viewing in "Colbert Nation" to "make as many edits as possible" to the entries of possible Romney running mates.

Wikipedia then added a "Colbert vandalism invitation" to the "talk" page in the Pawlenty entry and the lock appeared.

Sifry noted in a TechPresident post today that Portman's Wikipedia entry had been edited 112 times since Sunday while Rubio got 52 edits and Pawlenty 18.

"I guess we all just pushed the needle deeper into the haystack," Sifry wrote.