Are there any best practices for securely handling user passwords in PHP applications?

Storing user passwords securely is crucial in PHP applications to prevent unauthorized access in case of a data breach. One best practice is to hash passwords using a strong hashing algorithm like bcrypt and store the hashed passwords in the database. Additionally, using unique salts for each password can further enhance security.

// Hashing user password using bcrypt
$password = 'user_password';
$hashed_password = password_hash($password, PASSWORD_BCRYPT);

// Verifying user password
if (password_verify($password, $hashed_password)) {
    echo 'Password is correct';
} else {
    echo 'Password is incorrect';
}