What potential pitfalls should be considered when using PHP and MySQL to build a database-driven website?

One potential pitfall when using PHP and MySQL to build a database-driven website is SQL injection attacks. To prevent this, you should always use prepared statements with parameterized queries to sanitize user input and prevent malicious SQL code from being executed.

// Example of using prepared statements to prevent SQL injection

// Assume $mysqli is a valid MySQLi connection object

$username = $_POST['username'];
$password = $_POST['password'];

$stmt = $mysqli->prepare("SELECT * FROM users WHERE username = ?");
$stmt->bind_param("s", $username);
$stmt->execute();
$result = $stmt->get_result();

// Process the result