diff --git a/libnm-core/nm-utils.c b/libnm-core/nm-utils.c
index d79bf9eda..44d360b39 100644
--- a/libnm-core/nm-utils.c
+++ b/libnm-core/nm-utils.c
@@ -5444,6 +5444,10 @@ nm_utils_parse_variant_attributes (const char *string,
 				return NULL;
 			}
 
+			/* The attribute and key/value separators are the same. Look for the next one. */
+			if (ptr == sep)
+				goto next;
+
 			name = attribute_unescape (start, sep);
 			value = attribute_unescape (sep + 1, ptr);