diff --git a/http.c b/http.c
index 81b5cf8039..623ed23489 100644
--- a/http.c
+++ b/http.c
@@ -1509,7 +1509,16 @@ struct active_request_slot *get_active_slot(void)
 	slot->finished = NULL;
 	slot->callback_data = NULL;
 	slot->callback_func = NULL;
+
+	if (curl_cookie_file && !strcmp(curl_cookie_file, "-")) {
+		warning(_("refusing to read cookies from http.cookiefile '-'"));
+		FREE_AND_NULL(curl_cookie_file);
+	}
 	curl_easy_setopt(slot->curl, CURLOPT_COOKIEFILE, curl_cookie_file);
+	if (curl_save_cookies && (!curl_cookie_file || !curl_cookie_file[0])) {
+		curl_save_cookies = 0;
+		warning(_("ignoring http.savecookies for empty http.cookiefile"));
+	}
 	if (curl_save_cookies)
 		curl_easy_setopt(slot->curl, CURLOPT_COOKIEJAR, curl_cookie_file);
 	curl_easy_setopt(slot->curl, CURLOPT_HTTPHEADER, pragma_header);