sqlmapproject/sqlmap · error · OperationalError

handshake failed (%s)

Error message

handshake failed (%s)

What it means

Error "handshake failed (%s)" thrown in sqlmapproject/sqlmap.

Source

Thrown at extra/dbwire/mysql.py:350

        if not (flags & _CLIENT_PLUGIN_AUTH):
            plugin = None       # pre-4.1.1 style: no trailing plugin name in the handshake response
        response = struct.pack("<I", flags) + struct.pack("<I", _MAX_PACKET) + struct.pack("<B", 45) + (b"\x00" * 23)
        response += (user or "").encode("utf-8") + b"\x00"
        response += struct.pack("<B", len(auth_response)) + auth_response
        if database:
            response += database.encode("utf-8") + b"\x00"
        if plugin:
            response += plugin.encode("ascii") + b"\x00"
        _send_packet(sock, seq + 1, response)

        _finish_auth(sock, password or "", plugin or "mysql_native_password", salt)
        handshake_done(sock)
    except (DatabaseError, InterfaceError):
        _safe_close(sock)
        raise
    except Exception as ex:
        _safe_close(sock)
        raise OperationalError("handshake failed (%s)" % ex)

    connection = Connection(sock)
    # SET NAMES: reset collation_connection to the server's default (the fixed handshake collation 45 =
    # utf8mb4_general_ci otherwise clashes with MySQL 8's utf8mb4_0900_ai_ci columns -> 'illegal mix of
    # collations' 1271 in a UNION/CONCAT); results stay utf8mb4 so the utf-8 decode is unchanged. autocommit=1
    # so DML persists even if the server default is autocommit=0. Best-effort (one-time, at connect) - but the
    # charset has to land on *something*, else rows decode as utf-8 that never was: pre-5.5.3 servers have no
    # utf8mb4, and 'utf8' (3-byte) is the fallback every 4.1+ server does have.
    for alternatives in (("SET NAMES utf8mb4", "SET NAMES utf8"), ("SET autocommit=1",)):
        for setup in alternatives:
            try:
                connection._query(setup)
                break
            except Exception:
                pass
    return connection

def _safe_close(sock):

View on GitHub (pinned to 0a35b20e39)

When it happens

Trigger: Thrown at extra/dbwire/mysql.py:350 when the library encounters an invalid state.

Common situations: See trigger scenarios.

Understand the failure class

• SSL/TLS and certificate errors — how TLS handshakes and certificate validation fail.

AI-assisted analysis of sqlmapproject/sqlmap@0a35b20e39 (2026-08-26). Data as JSON: /api/errors/fcecf88b3e627bc6. Report an issue: GitHub.