What are common pitfalls when using PHP to query MySQL data?

One common pitfall when using PHP to query MySQL data is not properly sanitizing user input, which can leave your application vulnerable to SQL injection attacks. To solve this issue, always use prepared statements or parameterized queries to securely interact with the database.

// Example of using prepared statements to query MySQL data securely
$stmt = $pdo->prepare("SELECT * FROM users WHERE username = :username");
$stmt->bindParam(':username', $username);
$stmt->execute();
$results = $stmt->fetchAll();