PHP replace all characters with asterisk

Question

So lets say I have a password in the form of a string:

$password = "thisisaplaintextpassword"

How can I turn it into the following?

$password = "************************"

I would like to send users their account details via email, and don't want to send the entire thing.

Answer 1

Use str_repeat

$password = str_repeat("*", strlen($password)); 

Answer 2

function hidePassword($p) {
    $fit = strlen($p);
    return sprintf("%'*-${fit}s",false);
}

echo hidePassword($p);