diff --git a/CHANGES b/CHANGES
index 9dbb21213c5e5cb5bd8f2eccca01232ac0160090..dbb70cb119e05e5f391c0f7efc41eb2917eb08fa 100644
--- a/CHANGES
+++ b/CHANGES
@@ -4,6 +4,10 @@
 
  Changes between 0.9.7 and 0.9.8  [xx XXX 2002]
 
+  *) Let 'openssl req' fail if an argument to '-newkey' is not
+     recognized instead of using RSA as a default.
+     [Bodo Moeller]
+
   *) Add support for ECC-based ciphersuites from draft-ietf-tls-ecc-01.txt.
      As these are not official, they are not included in "ALL";
      the "ECCdraft" ciphersuite group alias can be used to select them.
diff --git a/apps/req.c b/apps/req.c
index 79b1ded735f39d0401b8f12c7f1bf8a2536d6bbb..729cb2d5bd74f47bd9a1e8f69b4d6db93887b920 100644
--- a/apps/req.c
+++ b/apps/req.c
@@ -383,7 +383,9 @@ int MAIN(int argc, char **argv)
 				}
 			else
 #endif
-				pkey_type=TYPE_RSA;
+				{
+				goto bad;
+				}
 
 			newreq=1;
 			}