mysqli_real_escape_string() returns empty string

Question

I\'m using mysqli_real_escape_string() on an email address, and it returns an empty string. It does this with any email address.

Answer 1

I had this problem and found that my character set was set to latin. Solved by putting

$con->set_charset("utf8");

before the real_escape_string. Would be mysqli_set_charset in procedural style.

Answer 2

If your connection is empty ($link), it will return an empty string. I tested this and it worked fine. I would recommend that you add error handling to your connection and enable error reporting.

<?php
$link = mysqli_connect("localhost", "root", "root", "test");

/* check connection */
if (mysqli_connect_errno()) {
    printf("Connect failed: %s\n", mysqli_connect_error());
    exit();
}

$_POST['email'] = "aehmlo@aehmlo.com";

$email = mysqli_real_escape_string($link, $_POST['email']);

var_dump($email);

mysqli_close($link);
?>

Result

string(17) "aehmlo@aehmlo.com"