What are common errors to watch out for when using PHP for news search functionality?

One common error to watch out for when using PHP for news search functionality is not properly sanitizing user input, which can lead to SQL injection attacks. To prevent this, always use prepared statements when querying the database to ensure that user input is properly escaped.

// Example of using prepared statements to prevent SQL injection

$search_query = $_GET['search_query'];

// Prepare the SQL statement
$stmt = $pdo->prepare("SELECT * FROM news WHERE title LIKE :search_query");
$stmt->bindValue(':search_query', "%$search_query%", PDO::PARAM_STR);

// Execute the statement
$stmt->execute();

// Fetch the results
$results = $stmt->fetchAll();