How does PHP handle HTTPS requests differently from HTTP requests?

When handling HTTPS requests, PHP needs to ensure that the communication between the client and server is secure by using SSL/TLS encryption. This involves verifying the server's SSL certificate, setting up a secure connection, and handling encrypted data transmission. To properly handle HTTPS requests in PHP, you can use functions like cURL or stream contexts to make secure requests and handle SSL certificate verification.

$url = 'https://example.com/api';
$ch = curl_init();
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_URL, $url);
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, true);
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_SSL_VERIFYPEER, true);
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_SSL_VERIFYHOST, 2);
$response = curl_exec($ch);
curl_close($ch);

echo $response;