Are there any potential security risks when sending emails using SMTP or POP3 in PHP?

When sending emails using SMTP or POP3 in PHP, there are potential security risks such as exposing sensitive information like login credentials. To mitigate these risks, it is recommended to use secure protocols like SMTP with SSL/TLS or POP3 with SSL/TLS to encrypt the communication between the server and the client. 

// Example of sending an email using SMTP with SSL/TLS in PHP
use PHPMailer\PHPMailer\PHPMailer;
use PHPMailer\PHPMailer\SMTP;
use PHPMailer\PHPMailer\Exception;

// Load Composer's autoloader
require 'vendor/autoload.php';

// Instantiation and passing `true` enables exceptions
$mail = new PHPMailer(true);

try {
    //Server settings
    $mail->isSMTP();
    $mail->Host = 'smtp.example.com';
    $mail->SMTPAuth = true;
    $mail->Username = 'your@example.com';
    $mail->Password = 'yourpassword';
    $mail->SMTPSecure = PHPMailer::ENCRYPTION_STARTTLS;
    $mail->Port = 587;

    //Recipients
    $mail->setFrom('from@example.com', 'Your Name');
    $mail->addAddress('recipient@example.net', 'Recipient Name');

    //Content
    $mail->isHTML(true);
    $mail->Subject = 'Subject';
    $mail->Body = 'Email body content';

    $mail->send();
    echo 'Message has been sent';
} catch (Exception $e) {
    echo "Message could not be sent. Mailer Error: {$mail->ErrorInfo}";
}

Keywords

SMTP POP3 security risks email sending PHP

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