JSON Utility not parsing a field with a "@" symbol in front

Scripting C# & .NET
1

So I am using the JSON utility to parse some data from my server, and it works for all my fields really well except for one. The field is called “@timestamp” and it is relatively important for what I am trying to do.

Here is some example output:

"hits" : [
      {
        "_index" : "packetbeat-2017.03.01",
        "_type" : "flow",
        "_id" : "AVqKz-18tMLfAv1xdACp",
        "_score" : null,
        "_source" : {
          "@timestamp" : "2017-03-01T16:59:25.303Z",
          "transport" : "tcp",
          "dest" : {
            "port" : 5432,
            "stats" : {
              "net_bytes_total" : 204270,
              "net_packets_total" : 193
            },
            "ip" : "192.168.203.45",
            "mac" : "00:16:47:9d:f2:c4"
          },
          "packet_source" : {
            "port" : 34459,
            "stats" : {
              "net_bytes_total" : 16030,
              "net_packets_total" : 165
            },
            "ip" : "192.168.204.45",
            "mac" : "aa:00:04:00:0a:04"
          },
          "tags" : [
            "beats_input_raw_event"
          ]
        },
        "sort" : [
          1488387565303
        ]
      }
    ]

And here is my C# class that is being used for the JSON Utility:

[System.Serializable]
public class HitsData_Packet
{
    public string _id;
    //public string @timestamp;
    public Source_Packet _source;
}

// This is really the information that I care about right now
[System.Serializable]
public class Source_Packet
{
    // Packetbeat stuff
    public string @timestamp;
    public string transport;
    public DestinationData_Packetbeat dest;
    public SourceData_Packetbeat packet_source;

    public string service;
    public string proto;

    public int sourceIpInt;
    public int destIpInt;
}

[System.Serializable]
public class SourceData_Packetbeat
{
    public int port;
    public string ip;
    public string mac;
}

[System.Serializable]
public class DestinationData_Packetbeat
{
    public int port;
    public string ip;
    public string mac;
}
2

Why does timestamp have an @ symbol in the first place? In C# @ allows you to use reserved words as variable names such as

int @int  = 5;

…and “timestamp” is not a reserved word. Why have it at all?

What’s the source of the JSON file? If it’s something you have control over, remove the @ and you’re done. If it’s not something you have control over, then JSONUtility won’t ever work for you - get something like LitJSON instead (and you’ll probably have to hardcode a special case for the @.)

Hell, if you don’t like coding special cases (and who does), you may want to take your JSON string before JSONUtility ever touches it, and find/replace @timestamp with timestamp.