diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index 81349a8..a07c4ca 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -4,6 +4,10 @@
 All notable changes to this project will be documented in this file.
 This project adheres to [Semantic Versioning](https://semver.org/spec/v2.0.0.html).
 
+## [v2.5.5-SNAPSHOT] - 2024-04-16
+
+ - Bug #27218 fixed null pointer exception of parsing user from json
+
 ## [v2.5.4] - 2022-07-06
 
  - Feature #23622 added Catalogue-Manager and Moderator roles
diff --git a/pom.xml b/pom.xml
index 56eccee..c97bb64 100644
--- a/pom.xml
+++ b/pom.xml
@@ -10,7 +10,7 @@
 	</parent>
 	<groupId>org.gcube.dvos</groupId>
 	<artifactId>usermanagement-core</artifactId>
-	<version>2.5.4</version>
+	<version>2.5.5-SNAPSHOT</version>
 	<packaging>jar</packaging>
 
 	<name>User Management API</name>
diff --git a/src/main/java/org/gcube/vomanagement/usermanagement/impl/ws/LiferayWSUserManager.java b/src/main/java/org/gcube/vomanagement/usermanagement/impl/ws/LiferayWSUserManager.java
index a0c0cdb..659e82e 100644
--- a/src/main/java/org/gcube/vomanagement/usermanagement/impl/ws/LiferayWSUserManager.java
+++ b/src/main/java/org/gcube/vomanagement/usermanagement/impl/ws/LiferayWSUserManager.java
@@ -147,8 +147,12 @@ public class LiferayWSUserManager implements UserManager{
 	private GCubeUser mapLRUser(String json){	
 		try{
 			if (json != null) {
+				logger.info("user json to be parsed: " , json);
 				JSONParser parser = new JSONParser();
 				JSONObject userJSON = (JSONObject)parser.parse(json);
+				if(userJSON!=null){
+					logger.info("parsed user json: " , userJSON.toString());
+				}
 				// TODO skip for now
 				List<Email> emails = new ArrayList<Email>();
 				//			for (EmailAddress e : u.getEmailAddresses()) {
@@ -161,15 +165,17 @@ public class LiferayWSUserManager implements UserManager{
 				} catch (Exception e1) {
 					logger.warn("Failed to retrieve property " + USER_LOCATION_INDUSTRY_KEY, e1);
 				}
-
+				if(userJSON!=null){
+					logger.info("parsed user json: " , userJSON.toString());
+				}
 				// retrieve the contact id information (it is into the user json)
-				long contactId = (long)userJSON.get("contactId");
-
-				// retrieve contact json obj from contactId
-				String jsonContact = getContactJson(contactId);
-				JSONObject contactJSON = (JSONObject)parser.parse(jsonContact);
-
-				return new GCubeUser(
+				String jsonContact;
+				JSONObject contactJSON;
+				try{
+					long contactId = (long)userJSON.get("contactId");
+					jsonContact = getContactJson(contactId);
+					contactJSON = (JSONObject)parser.parse(jsonContact);
+					return new GCubeUser(
 						(long)userJSON.get("userId"), 
 						(String)userJSON.get("screenName"), 
 						(String)userJSON.get("emailAddress"), 
@@ -183,6 +189,23 @@ public class LiferayWSUserManager implements UserManager{
 						(String)userJSON.get("jobTitle"),
 						locationIndustry, 
 						emails);
+				}catch (Exception e) {
+					logger.warn("Failed to retrieve property " + "contactId", e);
+					return new GCubeUser(
+						(long)userJSON.get("userId"), 
+						(String)userJSON.get("screenName"), 
+						(String)userJSON.get("emailAddress"), 
+						(String)userJSON.get("firstName"),
+						(String)userJSON.get("middleName"),
+						(String)userJSON.get("lastName"),
+						buildFullName(userJSON),
+						(long)userJSON.get("createDate"),
+						getUserAvatarAbsoluteURL((String)userJSON.get("uuid"), (long)userJSON.get("portraitId")), // skip for now TODO getUserAvatarAbsoluteURL(u)
+						false,
+						(String)userJSON.get("jobTitle"),
+						locationIndustry, 
+						emails);
+				}
 			}
 		}catch(Exception e){
 			logger.error("Exception while mapping the json user object to the GCubeUser java object", e);