diff --git a/fail2ban-p2p-client.py b/fail2ban-p2p-client.py
index 1ab2ef8..ac717e2 100755
--- a/fail2ban-p2p-client.py
+++ b/fail2ban-p2p-client.py
@@ -98,8 +98,9 @@ if args.b or dump:
 
     SignEVP = M2Crypto.EVP.load_key(c.privkey)
     SignEVP.sign_init()
-    SignEVP.sign_update(signed_message)
-    StringSignature = SignEVP.sign_final().encode('hex')
+    encoded_signed_message = signed_message.encode('utf-8')
+    SignEVP.sign_update(encoded_signed_message)
+    StringSignature = binascii.hexlify(SignEVP.sign_final()).decode('utf-8')
 
     signed_dict = {
         #"protocolVersion": version.protocol,