diff --git a/public/language/en_GB/error.json b/public/language/en_GB/error.json
index 62908a30db..7c4baf4cc4 100644
--- a/public/language/en_GB/error.json
+++ b/public/language/en_GB/error.json
@@ -16,6 +16,7 @@
 	"invalid-user-data": "Invalid User Data",
 	"invalid-password": "Invalid Password",
 	"invalid-username-or-password": "Please specify both a username and password",
+	"invalid-search-term": "Invalid search term",
 
 	"invalid-pagination-value": "Invalid pagination value",
 
diff --git a/public/src/modules/search.js b/public/src/modules/search.js
index aa035367a8..177e532c38 100644
--- a/public/src/modules/search.js
+++ b/public/src/modules/search.js
@@ -7,6 +7,12 @@ define('search', ['navigator'], function(nav) {
 		};
 
 	Search.query = function(term, callback) {
+		try {
+			term = encodeURIComponent(term);
+		} catch(e) {
+			return app.alertError('[[error:invalid-search-term]]');
+		}
+
 		// Detect if a tid was specified
 		var topicSearch = term.match(/in:topic-([\d]+)/);