My favorite gag gift.

So the elephants are coming to town. I can already hear the Black Bloc kids, the Occupy folks, and the storm trooper cops screaming on the streets. Ahh, it's election time in America. So you will want to preserve that precious smartphone battery and soak up some power-sipping WiFi while Romney's being roasted on the streets and hand-jobbed in the Forum. But there are some things you need to know about all the free interwebs. Remember it's likely that the Black Bloc kids are plants and will be kept at bay outside the convention, but there are a few other groups that no one can keep out. They slither along the airwaves to your laptop and smartphone. Names like Anonymous immediately come to mind.

These so-called hacktivists are kind of heroes of mine, and the elephants not so much. I could tell you exactly how to keep them out, but I'll let Kevin Mitnick do it. You see once a long long time ago, like before the iPhone long time ago, there was this master hacker who got busted and went white hat. Well, he's throwing out some decent tips on how to keep yourself safe while attending, or reporting on, or protesting, or just hanging around one of the biggest targets for hackers ever.

This article appears in Aug 9-15, 2012.