diff --git a/roles/badges-backend/files/cron/award-libravatar-badge b/roles/badges-backend/files/cron/award-libravatar-badge
index 4150eb0efc..1ece8cfac2 100644
--- a/roles/badges-backend/files/cron/award-libravatar-badge
+++ b/roles/badges-backend/files/cron/award-libravatar-badge
@@ -40,7 +40,7 @@ def main():
             continue
 
         openid = "http://%s.id.fedoraproject.org/" % person.nickname
-        hash = hashlib.sha256(openid).hexdigest()
+        hash = hashlib.sha256(openid.encode('utf-8')).hexdigest()
         url = "https://seccdn.libravatar.org/avatar/%s?d=404" % hash
         response = requests.get(url)