SWIG is a tool that will automatically generate Java bindings to C++ code. It is possible to %ignore in SWIG a C++ object’s destructor, this is trivially achieved when using %ignoreall and then selectively %unignore-ing an API. SWIG cleans up C++ objects using a delete method, which is most commonly called by a finalizer. When a SWIG generated delete method can’t call a destructor, as it is hidden, the delete method throws an exception. However, in the case of a hidden C++ destructor SWIG also doesn’t generate a finalizer, and so the most common call to the delete method is removed. The consequence of this is that the SWIG objects leak their C++ counterpart and no warnings or exceptions are thrown.
This check looks for the pattern of a memory leaking SWIG generated object and warns about the potential memory leak. The most straightforward fix is to the SWIG input code to tell it not to %ignore the C++ code’s destructor.
Suppress false positives by adding the suppression annotation @SuppressWarnings("SwigMemoryLeak") to the enclosing element.