diff --git a/Misc/NEWS b/Misc/NEWS
index 7a6e22d563d..eee36c606d8 100644
--- a/Misc/NEWS
+++ b/Misc/NEWS
@@ -12,6 +12,9 @@ What's New in Python 2.5 release candidate 1?
 Core and builtins
 -----------------
 
+- Patch #1232023: Stop including current directory in search
+  path on Windows.
+
 - Fix some potential crashes found with failmalloc.
 
 - Fix warnings reported by Klocwork's static analysis tool.
diff --git a/PC/getpathp.c b/PC/getpathp.c
index 2bd3f2653fd..729d2e4736b 100644
--- a/PC/getpathp.c
+++ b/PC/getpathp.c
@@ -297,6 +297,10 @@ getpythonregpath(HKEY keyBase, int skipcore)
 		}
 		RegCloseKey(subKey);
 	}
+
+	/* return null if no path to return */
+	if (dataSize == 0) goto done;
+
 	/* original datasize from RegQueryInfo doesn't include the \0 */
 	dataBuf = malloc((dataSize+1) * sizeof(TCHAR));
 	if (dataBuf) {