In 3.6 the names of node group sockets were using char arrays, but now use allocated strings. The RNA system assigns nullptr to such strings when assigning an empty string through python (UI assignment appears to always generate a valid string). This creates issues with many STL functions, in particular assigning nullptr to `std::string` will crash. We have to check for valid pointers before using them in places that don't handle nullptrs. Pull Request: https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/pulls/113924