diff --git a/hbase-client/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/hbase/zookeeper/ZKUtil.java b/hbase-client/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/hbase/zookeeper/ZKUtil.java
index 7cd0446eda9..6eb6584046f 100644
--- a/hbase-client/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/hbase/zookeeper/ZKUtil.java
+++ b/hbase-client/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/hbase/zookeeper/ZKUtil.java
@@ -664,7 +664,7 @@ public class ZKUtil {
       return node;
     }
     public boolean isEmpty() {
-      return (data.length == 0);
+      return (data == null || data.length == 0);
     }
   }