base64 encoding is often used to protect PHP code. There is an online tool that allows you to encode and decode the code. Here is the link: Base64 Encoding/Decoding Tool by Thomas Horsten.
It really works with the code you have. It’s a common kind of PHP protection and this tool reveals the opinion that base64 encoding is secure and it’s enough for code protection. If you hae any ideas on how to protect the PHP code, you’re welcome to post them in your comments.
Zend, Ioncube, etc are not enough as there are some paid services that offer “dezend” and “deioncube”. Code obfuscation… hmm, it just increases the time used to modify such a code, but doesn’t really help.
I would like to have my PHP scripts protected, but I don’t know any good protection method at the moment.
