sqlmapproject/sqlmap · error · SqlmapDataException

problem occurred while parsing an URL

Error message

problem occurred while parsing an URL '%s' ('%s')

What it means

_setHostname derives conf.hostname from --url by calling urllib.parse.urlsplit and taking netloc up to the colon. A ValueError from urlsplit — malformed IPv6 literal, invalid port segment, or other unparseable URL — is caught and re-raised as this SqlmapDataException with the URL and the parser error; it fires during init before any request, so the target URL itself is at fault.

Solutions

1. Fix the --url value to a well-formed URL, e.g. `http://target/page.php?id=1`.
2. Bracket IPv6 hosts: `http://[fe80::1]/path` instead of a bare IPv6 literal.
3. Remove invalid port text (e.g. `host:abc`) or stray characters/whitespace from the URL.
4. Pre-encode problematic characters (spaces, unescaped reserved chars) in the path/query.

When it happens

Trigger: Thrown at lib/core/option.py:1693 when the library encounters an invalid state.

Common situations: See trigger scenarios.

AI-assisted analysis of sqlmapproject/sqlmap@0a35b20e39 (2026-08-26). Data as JSON: /api/errors/2a9097f94bb2a3cf. Report an issue: GitHub.

Appendix: source

Thrown at lib/core/option.py:1693

    if conf.cookie:
        debugMsg = "setting the HTTP Cookie header"
        logger.debug(debugMsg)

        conf.httpHeaders.append((HTTP_HEADER.COOKIE, conf.cookie))

def _setHostname():
    """
    Set value conf.hostname
    """

    if conf.url:
        try:
            conf.hostname = _urllib.parse.urlsplit(conf.url).netloc.split(':')[0]
        except ValueError as ex:
            errMsg = "problem occurred while "
            errMsg += "parsing an URL '%s' ('%s')" % (conf.url, getSafeExString(ex))
            raise SqlmapDataException(errMsg)

def _setHTTPTimeout():
    """
    Set the HTTP timeout
    """

    if conf.timeout:
        debugMsg = "setting the HTTP timeout"
        logger.debug(debugMsg)

        conf.timeout = float(conf.timeout)

        if conf.timeout < 3.0:
            warnMsg = "the minimum HTTP timeout is 3 seconds, sqlmap "
            warnMsg += "will going to reset it"
            logger.warning(warnMsg)

            conf.timeout = 3.0

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