diff --git a/sql/catalyst/src/main/java/org/apache/spark/sql/catalyst/expressions/UnsafeRow.java b/sql/catalyst/src/main/java/org/apache/spark/sql/catalyst/expressions/UnsafeRow.java
index 7492b88c471a4..1a351933a366c 100644
--- a/sql/catalyst/src/main/java/org/apache/spark/sql/catalyst/expressions/UnsafeRow.java
+++ b/sql/catalyst/src/main/java/org/apache/spark/sql/catalyst/expressions/UnsafeRow.java
@@ -177,6 +177,10 @@ public void pointTo(byte[] buf, int sizeInBytes) {
     pointTo(buf, Platform.BYTE_ARRAY_OFFSET, sizeInBytes);
   }
 
+  public void setTotalSize(int sizeInBytes) {
+    this.sizeInBytes = sizeInBytes;
+  }
+
   public void setNotNullAt(int i) {
     assertIndexIsValid(i);
     BitSetMethods.unset(baseObject, baseOffset, i);
diff --git a/sql/core/src/main/java/org/apache/spark/sql/execution/datasources/parquet/UnsafeRowParquetRecordReader.java b/sql/core/src/main/java/org/apache/spark/sql/execution/datasources/parquet/UnsafeRowParquetRecordReader.java
index a6758bddfa7d0..198bfb6d67aee 100644
--- a/sql/core/src/main/java/org/apache/spark/sql/execution/datasources/parquet/UnsafeRowParquetRecordReader.java
+++ b/sql/core/src/main/java/org/apache/spark/sql/execution/datasources/parquet/UnsafeRowParquetRecordReader.java
@@ -256,6 +256,15 @@ private boolean loadBatch() throws IOException {
       numBatched = num;
       batchIdx = 0;
     }
+
+    // Update the total row lengths if the schema contained variable length. We did not maintain
+    // this as we populated the columns.
+    if (containsVarLenFields) {
+      for (int i = 0; i < numBatched; ++i) {
+        rows[i].setTotalSize(rowWriters[i].holder().totalSize());
+      }
+    }
+
     return true;
   }
 
diff --git a/sql/core/src/test/scala/org/apache/spark/sql/execution/datasources/parquet/ParquetIOSuite.scala b/sql/core/src/test/scala/org/apache/spark/sql/execution/datasources/parquet/ParquetIOSuite.scala
index 0c5d4887ed799..b0581e8b35510 100644
--- a/sql/core/src/test/scala/org/apache/spark/sql/execution/datasources/parquet/ParquetIOSuite.scala
+++ b/sql/core/src/test/scala/org/apache/spark/sql/execution/datasources/parquet/ParquetIOSuite.scala
@@ -38,6 +38,7 @@ import org.apache.parquet.schema.{MessageType, MessageTypeParser}
 import org.apache.spark.SparkException
 import org.apache.spark.sql._
 import org.apache.spark.sql.catalyst.ScalaReflection
+import org.apache.spark.sql.catalyst.expressions.UnsafeRow
 import org.apache.spark.sql.catalyst.util.DateTimeUtils
 import org.apache.spark.sql.test.SharedSQLContext
 import org.apache.spark.sql.types._
@@ -618,6 +619,29 @@ class ParquetIOSuite extends QueryTest with ParquetTest with SharedSQLContext {
       readResourceParquetFile("dec-in-fixed-len.parquet"),
       sqlContext.range(1 << 4).select('id % 10 cast DecimalType(10, 2) as 'fixed_len_dec))
   }
+
+  test("SPARK-12589 copy() on rows returned from reader works for strings") {
+    withTempPath { dir =>
+      val data = (1, "abc") ::(2, "helloabcde") :: Nil
+      data.toDF().write.parquet(dir.getCanonicalPath)
+      var hash1: Int = 0
+      var hash2: Int = 0
+      (false :: true :: Nil).foreach { v =>
+        withSQLConf(SQLConf.PARQUET_UNSAFE_ROW_RECORD_READER_ENABLED.key -> v.toString) {
+          val df = sqlContext.read.parquet(dir.getCanonicalPath)
+          val rows = df.queryExecution.toRdd.map(_.copy()).collect()
+          val unsafeRows = rows.map(_.asInstanceOf[UnsafeRow])
+          if (!v) {
+            hash1 = unsafeRows(0).hashCode()
+            hash2 = unsafeRows(1).hashCode()
+          } else {
+            assert(hash1 == unsafeRows(0).hashCode())
+            assert(hash2 == unsafeRows(1).hashCode())
+          }
+        }
+      }
+    }
+  }
 }
 
 class JobCommitFailureParquetOutputCommitter(outputPath: Path, context: TaskAttemptContext)