What are the potential security risks of trying to open remote files using fopen in PHP?

When using fopen in PHP to open remote files, there is a potential security risk of allowing attackers to access sensitive files on the server or execute malicious code. To mitigate this risk, it is recommended to use cURL instead of fopen when working with remote files in PHP. cURL provides more security features and control over the HTTP request, making it a safer option for handling remote files.

// Example of using cURL to open a remote file securely
$ch = curl_init();
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_URL, 'https://example.com/remote-file.txt');
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, true);
$response = curl_exec($ch);
curl_close($ch);

// Process the response as needed
echo $response;