Are there any best practices or security measures that should be implemented in the PHP script for better functionality?

Issue: To improve the security of a PHP script, it is essential to implement best practices such as input validation, output sanitization, and using prepared statements to prevent SQL injection attacks.

// Example of implementing input validation in PHP
$username = $_POST['username'];
if (empty($username)) {
    die("Username is required");
}

// Example of output sanitization in PHP
$unsafe_output = "<script>alert('XSS attack')</script>";
$safe_output = htmlspecialchars($unsafe_output);

// Example of using prepared statements to prevent SQL injection
$stmt = $pdo->prepare("SELECT * FROM users WHERE username = ?");
$stmt->execute([$username]);