Since PHP 5.4 there are constants which can be used by json_encode()
to format the json reponse how you want.
To remove backslashes use: JSON_UNESCAPED_SLASHES
. Like so:
json_encode($response, JSON_UNESCAPED_SLASHES);
View the PHP documentation for more constants and further information:
http://php.net/manual/en/function.json-encode.php
List of JSON constants: