diff --git a/hadoop-hdfs-project/hadoop-hdfs/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/hdfs/tools/offlineImageViewer/OfflineImageViewerPB.java b/hadoop-hdfs-project/hadoop-hdfs/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/hdfs/tools/offlineImageViewer/OfflineImageViewerPB.java
index 0f2ac81d8d5..e4afa994614 100644
--- a/hadoop-hdfs-project/hadoop-hdfs/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/hdfs/tools/offlineImageViewer/OfflineImageViewerPB.java
+++ b/hadoop-hdfs-project/hadoop-hdfs/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/hdfs/tools/offlineImageViewer/OfflineImageViewerPB.java
@@ -72,6 +72,7 @@ public class OfflineImageViewerPB {
       + "     rather than a number of bytes. (false by default)\n"
       + "  * Web: Run a viewer to expose read-only WebHDFS API.\n"
       + "    -addr specifies the address to listen. (localhost:5978 by default)\n"
+      + "    It does not support secure mode nor HTTPS.\n"
       + "  * Delimited (experimental): Generate a text file with all of the elements common\n"
       + "    to both inodes and inodes-under-construction, separated by a\n"
       + "    delimiter. The default delimiter is \\t, though this may be\n"
@@ -200,7 +201,7 @@ public class OfflineImageViewerPB {
       case "WEB":
         String addr = cmd.getOptionValue("addr", "localhost:5978");
         try (WebImageViewer viewer =
-            new WebImageViewer(NetUtils.createSocketAddr(addr))) {
+            new WebImageViewer(NetUtils.createSocketAddr(addr), conf)) {
           viewer.start(inputFile);
         }
         break;
diff --git a/hadoop-hdfs-project/hadoop-hdfs/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/hdfs/tools/offlineImageViewer/WebImageViewer.java b/hadoop-hdfs-project/hadoop-hdfs/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/hdfs/tools/offlineImageViewer/WebImageViewer.java
index 087972f94cc..a50e828e4a1 100644
--- a/hadoop-hdfs-project/hadoop-hdfs/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/hdfs/tools/offlineImageViewer/WebImageViewer.java
+++ b/hadoop-hdfs-project/hadoop-hdfs/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/hdfs/tools/offlineImageViewer/WebImageViewer.java
@@ -34,6 +34,9 @@ import io.netty.handler.codec.string.StringEncoder;
 import io.netty.util.concurrent.GlobalEventExecutor;
 import org.apache.commons.logging.Log;
 import org.apache.commons.logging.LogFactory;
+import org.apache.hadoop.conf.Configuration;
+import org.apache.hadoop.fs.CommonConfigurationKeysPublic;
+import org.apache.hadoop.security.UserGroupInformation;
 
 import java.io.Closeable;
 import java.io.IOException;
@@ -53,8 +56,12 @@ public class WebImageViewer implements Closeable {
   private final EventLoopGroup bossGroup;
   private final EventLoopGroup workerGroup;
   private final ChannelGroup allChannels;
+  private final Configuration conf;
 
   public WebImageViewer(InetSocketAddress address) {
+    this(address, new Configuration());
+  }
+  public WebImageViewer(InetSocketAddress address, Configuration conf) {
     this.address = address;
     this.bossGroup = new NioEventLoopGroup();
     this.workerGroup = new NioEventLoopGroup();
@@ -62,15 +69,25 @@ public class WebImageViewer implements Closeable {
     this.bootstrap = new ServerBootstrap()
       .group(bossGroup, workerGroup)
       .channel(NioServerSocketChannel.class);
+    this.conf = conf;
+    UserGroupInformation.setConfiguration(conf);
   }
 
   /**
    * Start WebImageViewer and wait until the thread is interrupted.
    * @param fsimage the fsimage to load.
    * @throws IOException if failed to load the fsimage.
+   * @throws RuntimeException if security is enabled in configuration.
    */
   public void start(String fsimage) throws IOException {
     try {
+      if (UserGroupInformation.isSecurityEnabled()) {
+        throw new RuntimeException(
+            "WebImageViewer does not support secure mode. To start in " +
+                "non-secure mode, pass -D" +
+                CommonConfigurationKeysPublic.HADOOP_SECURITY_AUTHENTICATION +
+                "=simple");
+      }
       initServer(fsimage);
       channel.closeFuture().await();
     } catch (InterruptedException e) {
diff --git a/hadoop-hdfs-project/hadoop-hdfs/src/site/markdown/HdfsImageViewer.md b/hadoop-hdfs-project/hadoop-hdfs/src/site/markdown/HdfsImageViewer.md
index bd3a797bfa0..6b0c27c8a29 100644
--- a/hadoop-hdfs-project/hadoop-hdfs/src/site/markdown/HdfsImageViewer.md
+++ b/hadoop-hdfs-project/hadoop-hdfs/src/site/markdown/HdfsImageViewer.md
@@ -26,7 +26,8 @@ The Offline Image Viewer provides several output processors:
 
 1.  Web is the default output processor. It launches a HTTP server
     that exposes read-only WebHDFS API. Users can investigate the namespace
-    interactively by using HTTP REST API.
+    interactively by using HTTP REST API. It does not support secure mode, nor
+    HTTPS.
 
 2.  XML creates an XML document of the fsimage and includes all of the
     information within the fsimage. The
diff --git a/hadoop-hdfs-project/hadoop-hdfs/src/test/java/org/apache/hadoop/hdfs/tools/offlineImageViewer/TestOfflineImageViewer.java b/hadoop-hdfs-project/hadoop-hdfs/src/test/java/org/apache/hadoop/hdfs/tools/offlineImageViewer/TestOfflineImageViewer.java
index b8078049be3..c84237cb836 100644
--- a/hadoop-hdfs-project/hadoop-hdfs/src/test/java/org/apache/hadoop/hdfs/tools/offlineImageViewer/TestOfflineImageViewer.java
+++ b/hadoop-hdfs-project/hadoop-hdfs/src/test/java/org/apache/hadoop/hdfs/tools/offlineImageViewer/TestOfflineImageViewer.java
@@ -18,6 +18,8 @@
 package org.apache.hadoop.hdfs.tools.offlineImageViewer;
 
 import com.google.common.collect.ImmutableMap;
+
+import static org.apache.hadoop.fs.CommonConfigurationKeysPublic.HADOOP_SECURITY_AUTHENTICATION;
 import static org.apache.hadoop.fs.permission.AclEntryScope.ACCESS;
 import static org.apache.hadoop.fs.permission.AclEntryType.GROUP;
 import static org.apache.hadoop.fs.permission.AclEntryType.OTHER;
@@ -100,8 +102,10 @@ import org.apache.hadoop.hdfs.server.namenode.NameNodeLayoutVersion;
 import org.apache.hadoop.hdfs.web.WebHdfsFileSystem;
 import org.apache.hadoop.io.IOUtils;
 import org.apache.hadoop.net.NetUtils;
+import org.apache.hadoop.security.UserGroupInformation;
 import org.apache.hadoop.security.token.Token;
 import org.apache.hadoop.test.GenericTestUtils;
+import org.apache.hadoop.test.LambdaTestUtils;
 import org.apache.log4j.Level;
 import org.junit.AfterClass;
 import org.junit.Assert;
@@ -583,6 +587,22 @@ public class TestOfflineImageViewer {
     }
   }
 
+  @Test
+  public void testWebImageViewerSecureMode() throws Exception {
+    Configuration conf = new Configuration();
+    conf.set(HADOOP_SECURITY_AUTHENTICATION, "kerberos");
+    try (WebImageViewer viewer =
+        new WebImageViewer(
+            NetUtils.createSocketAddr("localhost:0"), conf)) {
+      RuntimeException ex = LambdaTestUtils.intercept(RuntimeException.class,
+          "WebImageViewer does not support secure mode.",
+          () -> viewer.start("foo"));
+    } finally {
+      conf.set(HADOOP_SECURITY_AUTHENTICATION, "simple");
+      UserGroupInformation.setConfiguration(conf);
+    }
+  }
+
   @Test
   public void testPBDelimitedWriter() throws IOException, InterruptedException {
     testPBDelimitedWriter("");  // Test in memory db.