diff --git a/src/libutil/util.cc b/src/libutil/util.cc
index 6fcce5d67..691b03bb0 100644
--- a/src/libutil/util.cc
+++ b/src/libutil/util.cc
@@ -796,6 +796,11 @@ unsigned int getMaxCPU()
 
         auto cpuMax = readFile(cpuFile);
         auto cpuMaxParts = tokenizeString<std::vector<std::string>>(cpuMax, " \n");
+
+        if (cpuMaxParts.size() != 2) {
+            return 0;
+        }
+
         auto quota = cpuMaxParts[0];
         auto period = cpuMaxParts[1];
         if (quota != "max")