How can beginners improve their scripting knowledge to avoid security vulnerabilities in PHP applications?

To improve their scripting knowledge and avoid security vulnerabilities in PHP applications, beginners should focus on learning about common security threats such as SQL injection, cross-site scripting, and insecure file uploads. They should also familiarize themselves with secure coding practices, such as input validation, output encoding, and using prepared statements for database queries.

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