An important note below about using this function to secure your application against Cross Site Scripting (XSS) vulnerabilities.
When printing user input in an attribute of an HTML tag, the default configuration of htmlEntities() doesn't protect you against XSS, when using single quotes to define the border of the tag's attribute-value. XSS is then possible by injecting a single quote:
<?php
$_GET['a'] = "#000' onload='alert(document.cookie)";
?>
XSS possible (insecure):
<?php
$href = htmlEntities($_GET['a']);
print "<body bgcolor='$href'>"; ?>
Use the 'ENT_QUOTES' quote style option, to ensure no XSS is possible and your application is secure:
<?php
$href = htmlEntities($_GET['a'], ENT_QUOTES);
print "<body bgcolor='$href'>"; ?>
The 'ENT_QUOTES' option doesn't protect you against javascript evaluation in certain tag's attributes, like the 'href' attribute of the 'a' tag. When clicked on the link below, the given JavaScript will get executed:
<?php
$_GET['a'] = 'javascript:alert(document.cookie)';
$href = htmlEntities($_GET['a'], ENT_QUOTES);
print "<a href='$href'>link</a>"; ?>
