diff --git a/pkg/service/backup/worker_deduplicate.go b/pkg/service/backup/worker_deduplicate.go
index 5d8d1dd40..34f513e5c 100644
--- a/pkg/service/backup/worker_deduplicate.go
+++ b/pkg/service/backup/worker_deduplicate.go
@@ -52,7 +52,12 @@ func (w *worker) deduplicateHost(ctx context.Context, h hostInfo) error {
 			Recurse:   true,
 		}
 		if err := w.Client.RcloneListDirIter(ctx, h.IP, dataDst, listOpts, func(f *scyllaclient.RcloneListDirItem) {
-			id := sstable.ExtractID(f.Name)
+			id, err := sstable.ExtractID(f.Name)
+			if err != nil {
+				// just log and continue (should never happen)
+				w.Logger.Error(ctx, "Extracting SSTable generation ID of remote SSTable", "error", err)
+				return
+			}
 			remoteFilesSSTableIDSet[id] = struct{}{}
 		}); err != nil {
 			return errors.Wrapf(err, "host %s: listing all files from %s", h.IP, dataDst)
@@ -61,7 +66,12 @@ func (w *worker) deduplicateHost(ctx context.Context, h hostInfo) error {
 		// Iterate over all SSTable IDs and group files per ID.
 		ssTablesGroupByID := make(map[string][]string)
 		for _, file := range d.Progress.files {
-			id := sstable.ExtractID(file.Name)
+			id, err := sstable.ExtractID(file.Name)
+			if err != nil {
+				// just log and continue
+				w.Logger.Error(ctx, "Extracting SSTable generation ID", "error", err)
+				continue
+			}
 			ssTablesGroupByID[id] = append(ssTablesGroupByID[id], file.Name)
 		}
 
diff --git a/pkg/service/restore/tablesdir_worker.go b/pkg/service/restore/tablesdir_worker.go
index 54ac75655..b2942a9eb 100644
--- a/pkg/service/restore/tablesdir_worker.go
+++ b/pkg/service/restore/tablesdir_worker.go
@@ -571,7 +571,10 @@ type bundle []string
 func newBundles(fm FilesMeta) map[string]bundle {
 	bundles := make(map[string]bundle)
 	for _, f := range fm.Files {
-		id := sstable.ExtractID(f)
+		id, err := sstable.ExtractID(f)
+		if err != nil {
+			panic(err)
+		}
 		bundles[id] = append(bundles[id], f)
 	}
 	return bundles
diff --git a/pkg/sstable/sstable_naming.go b/pkg/sstable/sstable_naming.go
index d7c71dd9c..8aa88349a 100644
--- a/pkg/sstable/sstable_naming.go
+++ b/pkg/sstable/sstable_naming.go
@@ -29,17 +29,17 @@ const alphabet = "0123456789abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz"
 // Supported SSTable format versions are: "mc", "md", "me", "la", "ka".
 // Scylla code validating SSTable format can be found here:
 // https://github.com/scylladb/scylladb/blob/decbc841b749d8dd3e2ddd4be4817c57d905eff2/sstables/sstables.cc#L2115-L2117
-func ExtractID(sstable string) string {
+func ExtractID(sstable string) (string, error) {
 	parts := strings.Split(sstable, "-")
 
 	if regexLaMx.MatchString(sstable) || regexNewLaMx.MatchString(sstable) {
-		return parts[1]
+		return parts[1], nil
 	}
 	if regexKa.MatchString(sstable) {
-		return parts[3]
+		return parts[3], nil
 	}
 
-	panic(unknownSSTableError(sstable))
+	return "", unknownSSTableError(sstable)
 }
 
 // Crc32FileNameFromGivenSSTableFile returns name of the .crc32 file generated for the SSTable which contains
@@ -101,7 +101,10 @@ func RenameSStables(sstables []string, nameGen func(id string) string) map[strin
 	out := make(map[string]string)
 
 	for _, sst := range sstables {
-		id := ExtractID(sst)
+		id, err := ExtractID(sst)
+		if err != nil {
+			panic(err)
+		}
 		newID, ok := idMapping[id]
 		if !ok {
 			newID = nameGen(id)
diff --git a/pkg/sstable/sstable_naming_test.go b/pkg/sstable/sstable_naming_test.go
index ffcd9d4e8..cb8d5e988 100644
--- a/pkg/sstable/sstable_naming_test.go
+++ b/pkg/sstable/sstable_naming_test.go
@@ -55,7 +55,10 @@ func TestSExtractID(t *testing.T) {
 		tcase := testCases[id]
 		t.Run(tcase.in, func(t *testing.T) {
 			t.Parallel()
-			val := ExtractID(tcase.in)
+			val, err := ExtractID(tcase.in)
+			if err != nil {
+				t.Fatalf("invalid sstable, error = {%v}", err)
+			}
 			if tcase.expected != val {
 				t.Fatalf("expected %s, received %s", tcase.expected, val)
 			}