What potential pitfalls should be considered when passing data through URLs in PHP?

When passing data through URLs in PHP, potential pitfalls include security risks such as exposing sensitive information and making the data vulnerable to manipulation. To mitigate these risks, it is important to properly sanitize and validate the data before using it in your application.

// Sanitize and validate data passed through URLs
$data = isset($_GET['data']) ? htmlspecialchars($_GET['data']) : '';

// Use the sanitized data in your application
echo "Data passed through URL: " . $data;