diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index 1be4860a..7dc7fb09 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -14,6 +14,7 @@ This project adheres to [Semantic Versioning](http://semver.org/).
 - Rescue URI error when initializing a data string that contains a colon
 - Fragments with an odd number of components no longer raise an `undefined method `validate'`
   error
+- Data that looks like a URI but is invalid is now treated as a string
 
 ## [2.8.0] - 2017-02-07
 
diff --git a/lib/json-schema/validator.rb b/lib/json-schema/validator.rb
index c439b613..ecb1cf4e 100644
--- a/lib/json-schema/validator.rb
+++ b/lib/json-schema/validator.rb
@@ -594,6 +594,8 @@ def custom_open(uri)
       if uri.absolute? && Util::URI::SUPPORTED_PROTOCOLS.include?(uri.scheme)
         begin
           open(uri.to_s).read
+        rescue URI::InvalidURIError => e
+          raise JSON::Schema::UriError, e.message
         rescue OpenURI::HTTPError, Timeout::Error => e
           raise JSON::Schema::JsonLoadError, e.message
         end
diff --git a/test/initialize_data_test.rb b/test/initialize_data_test.rb
index cf08cbe1..46b4c601 100644
--- a/test/initialize_data_test.rb
+++ b/test/initialize_data_test.rb
@@ -109,6 +109,8 @@ def test_parse_invalid_uri_string
     end
 
     assert_raises(JSON::Schema::JsonLoadError) { JSON::Validator.validate(schema, data, :uri => true) }
+
+    assert(JSON::Validator.validate(schema, "http://a/%%30%30"))
   end
 
   def test_parse_invalid_scheme_string