What are common pitfalls when working with PHP and SQL together?

One common pitfall when working with PHP and SQL together is not properly sanitizing user input, which can lead to SQL injection attacks. To prevent this, always use prepared statements with parameterized queries when interacting with the database.

// Example of using prepared statements to prevent SQL injection

// Establish a database connection
$pdo = new PDO('mysql:host=localhost;dbname=mydatabase', 'username', 'password');

// Prepare a SQL statement with a placeholder for user input
$stmt = $pdo->prepare('SELECT * FROM users WHERE username = :username');

// Bind the user input to the placeholder
$stmt->bindParam(':username', $_POST['username']);

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

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