What are some common pitfalls to avoid when working with PHP sessions?

One common pitfall to avoid when working with PHP sessions is not properly securing the session data. To prevent session hijacking and other security vulnerabilities, it is important to use HTTPS, regenerate the session ID after a successful login, and store sensitive data in server-side sessions instead of client-side cookies. 

// Start a secure session
session_start([
    'cookie_lifetime' => 86400, // 1 day
    'cookie_secure' => true, // only send cookies over HTTPS
    'cookie_httponly' => true, // prevent JavaScript access to cookies
]);

// Regenerate session ID after successful login
if ($login_successful) {
    session_regenerate_id(true);
}

// Store sensitive data in server-side sessions
$_SESSION['user_id'] = $user_id;

Keywords

session_start session_regenerate_id session_destroy session hijacking session fixation

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