pinpoint-apm/pinpoint · error · IllegalArgumentException

Malformed webhook URL

Error message

Malformed webhook URL

What it means

WebhookUrlValidator.validateUriSyntax throws IllegalArgumentException (wrapping the original URISyntaxException) when the URL string cannot be parsed as a URI with a valid server authority, e.g. new URI(url).parseServerAuthority() fails. The URL is syntactically malformed.

Source

Thrown at commons-server/src/main/java/com/navercorp/pinpoint/common/server/webhook/WebhookUrlValidator.java:97

        return uri.toString();
    }

    public static String validateSyntax(String url) {
        return validateUriSyntax(url).toString();
    }

    private static URI validateUriSyntax(String url) {
        if (url == null || url.isBlank()) {
            throw new IllegalArgumentException("Webhook URL is required");
        }

        final URI uri;

        try {
            uri = new URI(url).normalize().parseServerAuthority();
        } catch (URISyntaxException e) {
            throw new IllegalArgumentException("Malformed webhook URL", e);
        }

        validateScheme(uri);
        validateAuthority(uri);

        return uri;
    }

    private static void validateScheme(URI uri) {
        String scheme = uri.getScheme();
        if (scheme == null) {
            throw new IllegalArgumentException("Webhook URL scheme is required");
        }

        String normalizedScheme = scheme.toLowerCase(Locale.ROOT);
        if (!"http".equals(normalizedScheme) && !"https".equals(normalizedScheme)) {
            throw new IllegalArgumentException("Webhook URL scheme must be http or https");
        }

View on GitHub (pinned to 744c3d3075)

Solutions

1. Fix the URL syntax: ensure scheme://host[:port]/path with legal characters
2. URL-encode special characters in path/query (e.g. spaces -> %20)
3. Use a URI builder or the original error message (getCause is URISyntaxException) to locate the offending character index

Example fix

// before
validator.validateSyntax("http://example.com/my webhook");
// after
validator.validateSyntax("http://example.com/my%20webhook");

try { new java.net.URI(url).parseServerAuthority(); } catch (java.net.URISyntaxException e) { /* reject */ }

try { WebhookUrlValidator.validateSyntax(url); } catch (IllegalArgumentException e) { Throwable cause = e.getCause(); if (cause instanceof URISyntaxException use) { log.error("bad URL at index {}", use.getIndex()); } }

When it happens

Trigger: Passing strings like 'http:/missing-host', 'http://exa mple.com', 'http://[bad-ipv6', or any string with illegal characters/unbalanced brackets to validateSyntax/uri.

Common situations: Hand-edited webhook config with a typo; URL copied with stray spaces or unencoded characters; missing double slash after scheme; unencoded special characters like '|' or spaces in the URL.

Understand the failure class

Background: "Invalid URL" errors: why new URL(), URI.parse, and reqwest::Url reject your string — missing scheme, whitespace, and bad path format — this error's family across 39 libraries.

• Parsing and encoding errors: unexpected token, malformed input — why parsers reject input and how to find the real culprit.

Related errors

• Webhook URL is required
• Webhook URL fragment is not allowed
• Webhook URL scheme is required
• Webhook URL scheme must be http or https
• Webhook URL host is required

AI-assisted analysis of pinpoint-apm/pinpoint@744c3d3075 (2026-09-07). Data as JSON: /api/errors/99acf9db1a412287. Report an issue: GitHub.