Sure. Phishing refers to e-mail communications that are made by the identify thief masquerading as a trusted institution such as a bank or eBay or PayPal or some financial institution. They request the recipient of the e-mail message to provide their account information in order to correct a problem or get access or whatever. I'm sure all of you have received these phishing e-mails. I receive them every day. They're simply ploys by fraudsters to get information that they need to access bank accounts and other accounts, in order to use them fraudulently.
Pharming refers to a similar kind of technique, where the thieves actually set up a website that very cleverly imitates the trusted financial institution or otherwise. They're able to basically redirect traffic intended to go the legitimate website to the fake website. Again, they invite people to enter their account details, etc., and then use that to engage in fraud.
There's a third new trend, which is “vishing”, which refers to voice communication. They're now using telephone communications and computerized messages to call someone. The consumer picks up the phone. There's a computer message that says it's such-and-such a bank—or trusted institution or whatever—and there's a problem with your account. Call this 1-800 number to deal with it. You call the 1-800 number, there's an interactive voice system, and it gets you to plug in all your account information. Once again, they collect it all that way.