What are some common pitfalls for beginners when creating a PHP file like account.php?

One common pitfall for beginners when creating a PHP file like account.php is not properly sanitizing user input, which can leave the application vulnerable to SQL injection attacks. To solve this issue, always use prepared statements or parameterized queries when interacting with a database to prevent SQL injection. 

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

Another common pitfall is not validating user input, which can lead to security vulnerabilities or unexpected behavior in the application. To solve this issue, always validate and sanitize user input before using it in your application.

```php
// Example of validating user input
if (isset($_POST['username'])) {
    $username = filter_var($_POST['username'], FILTER_SANITIZE_STRING);
}

Keywords

syntax errors variable scope SQL injection security vulnerabilities file permissions

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