diff --git a/CHANGES b/CHANGES
index f63afc41..b62c2ac6 100644
--- a/CHANGES
+++ b/CHANGES
@@ -1,6 +1,8 @@
 DD MMM YYYY - 2.9.3 - To be released
 ------------------------------------
 
+ * good practices: Initialize variables before use it
+   [Issue #1889 - Marc Stern]
  * Let body parsers observe SecRequestBodyNoFilesLimit
    [Issue #1613 - @allanbomsft]
  * potential off by one in parse_arguments
diff --git a/apache2/msc_util.c b/apache2/msc_util.c
index e3923ff2..2cc6065f 100644
--- a/apache2/msc_util.c
+++ b/apache2/msc_util.c
@@ -405,7 +405,8 @@ char *parse_pm_content(const char *op_parm, unsigned short int op_len, msre_rule
     char converted = 0;
     int i, x;
     unsigned char bin = 0, esc = 0, bin_offset = 0;
-    unsigned char bin_parm[3], c = 0;
+    unsigned char c = 0;
+    unsigned char bin_parm[3] = { 0 };
     char *processed = NULL;
 
     content = apr_pstrdup(rule->ruleset->mp, op_parm);